Chrome Management - Prevent installing apps / extensions

[DavR]

What have other people been doing about locking down the chrome web store on Chromebooks?

 

Ideally I want to prevent users installing apps / extensions from the web store, but none of the settings I've tried thus far actually prevents this.

 

I've got the Chrome Web Store app turned off under Admin Console | Apps for these users. I've played around with 'Allowed Apps and Extensions' under Device Management | Chrome | User Settings, but that only seems to affect whether an app will open / is visible, not whether you can install it.

 

I could block the Web Store URL I suppose, but that feels a bit drastic / clumsy.

 

Any ideas?

[ADMaster]

You're in the right place under user settings, see attached.

This can be done on a per org unit basis so you can block for students and allow for staff.

You can also go to the app management screen to change what org units are allowed / forced installed too.

 

[DavR]

Ah, I think I've finally got my head round it. I was using 'Block all except those I allow', but that wasn't working until I added some allowed apps into my allow list. If I have that set, it will still allow me to go to the Web Store and attempt to install apps, but they fail.

 

It's a pity you can't just disallow adding new apps and extensions, instead of having to create deny / allow lists. I'm not sure which solution I prefer, 'deny all except (list every app)' or just blocking the web store URL, both are a bit clumsy.

 

It can be done at least though!

[ADMaster]

You will want an allow list though, otherwise all apps will be removed the next time a user logs in.

This includes things like gmail, docs, slides, camera, etc.

It took me a few times of swapping a test account between OUs to find the built in apps across different models.

[DavR]

Yeah, I got that far, as it will block all the built in apps if you don't list them explicitly using that setting.

 

Luckily this is our first set of Chromebooks, and we've added no additional apps yet, so should be relatively simple to draw up the list.