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Configuring the Licensing Agent

In environments where Kiosk is being executed as a login hook, it may not be desirable to wait until the software is launched to ensure the license is properly activated.

In these scenarios, a system licensing agent can be deployed to ensure that license activation occurs automatically, without requiring user interaction.

Agent Installation

The agent is provided as a self-contained application bundle. The only required installation is to place the bundle to the following location: 

/Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/KioskLicensingAgent.app

Note that you may need to create this path if it does not exist on your system. Please ensure that the folder and application bundles are owned by the root user in the wheel group.

Launch Agent Configuration

To configure the launch agent, edit the supplied property list file (com.intelliscapesolutions.kiosk.plist) and replace the default values with your license details: 

<array>
	<string>/Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/.../Contents/MacOS/KioskLicensingAgent</string>
	<string>-activate</string>
	<string>key=[ACTIVATION KEY]</string>
	<string>email=[EMAIL ADDRESS]</string>
</array>


Take care not to modify other parts of the file, as this may prevent the agent from launching. Once completed, place the file in the following path: 

/Library/LaunchAgents/com.intelliscapesolutions.kiosk.plist

Again taking care to ensure the file has root:wheel ownership, as macOS strictly enforces this and will not launch the agent if the permissions are not correct.

Loading and Unloading the Agent

The agent will be loaded automatically by macOS as necessary; typically on system startup and when the user logs in or out. If you need to manually start the agent, you can do so by loading it as follows: 

$ sudo launchctl load -S LoginWindow /Library/LaunchAgents/com.intelliscapesolutions.kiosk.plist

Should you need to restart the agent after it has been loaded, you can do so by first issuing launchctl unload with the same parameters as above, then loading the agent again. You can view the output of the agent by checking the files /tmp/KioskLicensingAgent.out and /tmp/KioskLicensingAgent.err:

2018-10-29 22:53:39.215 KioskLicensingAgent[571:9385] Activating license...
2018-10-29 22:53:40.282 KioskLicensingAgent[571:9385] Activation successful.

Security Considerations

Please Note: Like the login hook functionality, macOS executes the provided agent as the root user.

If you are not launching Kiosk via a configured login hook, the licensing agent is not necessary - Kiosk will automatically prompt for activation the first time it is launched.

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