Mac Mini as Hotel Lobby Computer

[Shadowhawk]

I manage a hotel, and am a Mac supporter. I would love to set up a Mac Mini in the lobby for guests to use for browsing the internet, printing airline boarding passes, and printing documents.

Several companies make software for hotel lobby computers, but is there one for Macs? Obviously I could just play with all the settings, but I want an all-in-one solution so I wouldn't have to keep going back, and updating settings all the time.

Thanks.

 

[jsfpa]

printing airline boarding passes, and printing documents.

As much as I love Macs, you could have a problem. When trying to print a boarding pass for US-Air, they required Internet Explorer. I'm sure there are work arounds but in my case it was just easier to boot my XP partition.

 

[rdowns]

I don't think putting a Mac in a hotel lobby is a good idea. Most people don't know how to use a Mac or would be put off by its unfamiliarity. A computer in a hotel lobby exists for convenience.

 

[balamw]

You could always run XP on the mini.... Boot Camp lets you do that you know....

B

 

[Shadowhawk]

I don't think putting a Mac in a hotel lobby is a good idea. Most people don't know how to use a Mac or would be put off by its unfamiliarity. A computer in a hotel lobby exists for convenience.

Thats why I was hoping someone made an all-in-one program like they have for some other hotels (I know they have them for linux, so I assumed they would have one for Mac). It never actually lets the users into the desktop, it's just a program that acts as a operations shell with 3 or 4 options (internet, word doc, printing, airline passes).

Also, the Mac Mini is the perfect size for what I needed. I might just have to go with one of those mini HP computers.

 

[Eidorian]

http://www.deskbrowse.com/

That or Opera in Kiosk mode. I made a Windows 2000 kiosk with a limited account for our waiting room. No one uses the damn thing though.

 

[reh]

Several companies make software for hotel lobby computers, but is there one for Macs?

http://centuriontech.com/dsms-about.htm

I use the windows version of this on some library computers. I recommend it. It has saved me A LOT of work cleaning up after idiots that feel it's their duty to mess with public computers.

 

[CEAbiscuit]

The International House in New Orleans has an iMac in the lobby with Firefox as well as Safari. Has always worked for me. Go for it. Very cool hotel vibe, and the iMac just adds to it.

 

[ITASOR]

I don't think putting a Mac in a hotel lobby is a good idea. Most people don't know how to use a Mac or would be put off by its unfamiliarity. A computer in a hotel lobby exists for convenience.

Most of the kiosk browser programs have an address bar, back and forward buttons....so if it's just that running on the Mac, I don't think it would really matter, as it's not that different from a kiosk program running on a PC.

 

[OutThere]

Thats why I was hoping someone made an all-in-one program like they have for some other hotels (I know they have them for linux, so I assumed they would have one for Mac). It never actually lets the users into the desktop, it's just a program that acts as a operations shell with 3 or 4 options (internet, word doc, printing, airline passes).

Also, the Mac Mini is the perfect size for what I needed. I might just have to go with one of those mini HP computers.

So you can put linux on the mini and run the kiosk that you already have experienced/know about from there.