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edredi: Suggested Whitelist Methods

Below are a list of methods that will assist in covering many bases when whitelisting a Website Resource and why the method is being suggested. If you're not familiar with how to add a website as a Resource, please review the support article, Adding a Website as a Resource.

HOW WHITELISTING A URL WORKS

If an educationally-dedicated website is being whitelisted, and it is determined that it would be okay for the student to access other areas of the website during the Lesson, then this makes it okay to whitelist the whole website by its main domain. If a website's main domain is whitelisted, it will look something like this:

  • http://www.everydaymathonline.com

This means that any web address that starts with this URL, will be allowed access on the edredi secure browser. The following examples start with the above URL and will be allowed access:

  • http://www.everydaymathonline.com/workbook/science/index.html
  • http://www.everydaymathonline.com/workbook/math/vol2.html

WHEN TO WHITELIST

Adding HTTP and HTTPS versions of the URL

If the website being used requires any type of login, adding "https://" will more than likely save the trouble of finding out that it needs to be added later, as most logins almost always lead to an "https://" version of the website.

For example:

  • http://everydaymathonline.com
  • https://everydaymathonline.com

After typing in the first URL, be sure to press ENTER before typing in the next URL when adding multiple websites. When finished, it should look something like this:

Screen_Shot_2013-12-21_at_11.45.42_AM.png

To Add or Not to Add “www.” Versions of the Main URL

Not all websites have the "www." visible nowadays. This is because it's predominantly a standard, where it's automatically added behind the scenes in more updated browsers. Sometimes, it's not actually part of the URL, but since there isn't an easy way to be sure of this, it doesn't hurt to add both "www." versions of the website into the whitelist as well as versions of the web address without the "www.", just in case. So your Whitelist URLs field would include something like the following:

  • http://www.everydaymathonline.com
  • https://www.everydaymathonline.com
  • http://everydaymathonline.com
  • https://everydaymathonline.com

Adding the login page's URL

When accessing an online service, you normally log-in with your username and password.  To give you full access, you should always make sure the login page’s URL isn’t whitelisted by itself because the edredi secure browser will assume that the login page is the only page that should be access and nowhere else. Seeing that most websites with logins are normally okay to be explored in its entirety, it is suggested to either whitelist the entire website in the same manner as the previous suggestions or to wait until the website is explored to determine the URLs that will need to be added.

WHITELISTING TIPS

Explore the website(s) on your desktop computer beforehand

How do you know when to whitelist URLs? There are a couple of ways to locate URLs to whitelist.First, to locate the actual website URLs, roll over the buttons and links on the website and look for URLs at the lower left hand corner of the browser window. Look for URLs that may not have matching patterns to the main website. This will be particularly obvious if the URL strays from the main URL.

URL_bottom2.png

For example,

  • Instead of:
    http://www.everydaymathonline.com/quizzes/addition.html
  • this appears:
    http://em-ccss.everydaymathonline.com/subtraction.html

Because of the underlined addition of the main URL, the new URL in italics will need to be added to the whitelist. This is particularly true if the website re-directs itself to a mobile version of the website because it detected the edredi tablet as a mobile device.

whitelist.png
 
Second, click on the buttons and links that you’d like the students to access to view the URLs. If the link opens in a new window, take a look to see if a new URL appears at the top. This may need to be added to the whitelist.
 
NOTE:  Links that open in new browser windows are originally designed to work in desktop browsers. This means that it may or may not always work in the edredi secure browser or any other android browser.

If the site is a website hub to other websites, it may be more practical to target the web links that the students are intended to access. For more information on whitelisting URLs, please see the support article, Adding a URL to a Whitelist.

Check for error messages on the edredi tablet

After creating the Website Resource in the edredi cloud portal, test this same Resource on the edredi tablet while locked in Student Mode. If an error message flashes, an additional URL is being blocked. This is a good sign that this additional URL needs to be whitelisted. Pay attention to the URL that may be flashing.

Because error messages flash very quickly, you can try two different methods to re-flash the error message in order to catch the details:

  • Exit the Website Resource and then re-open the Website Resource as needed, OR
  • refresh the page by tapping the 3-dot icon at the bottom and tap on “refresh”. Whether or not this method is functional is dependent on the edredi device being used.

Using either of these methods will re-flash the error message after reloading the page, giving more opportunity to get the details of the URL. Try to write down the main part of the URL, then add this to the whitelist field. If it's not the Resource, but a link that flashes an error after the Resource has loaded, then all that needs to be done next is to click the link repeatedly until the URL needed can be written down.

For more hints on how much of the URL should be put into the whitelist, please see the support article on Adding a URL to a Whitelist.

An error message could just be the website re-directing to their mobile site. Newer and updated websites can detect mobile devices like tablets, and will re-direct you to their mobile version of their site, for example:

  • Instead of:
    http://youtube.com/123456
  • Something like this appears:
    http://m.youtube.com/123456
    --> The “m” is a fair hint that it’s the mobile URL and will need to be added to the whitelist field as well.
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