Admin panel · Dashboard
Admin panel
Dashboard
What each card, status line and button on the Admin panel's Dashboard means, and how to activate, deactivate and relock the kiosk from it.
The Dashboard is the first screen you see when the Admin panel opens. It shows the licence state, a row of status cards and a live activity feed. While the Dashboard is on screen it refreshes itself every 5 seconds, so you can leave it open and watch the kiosk work.
The Dashboard in Reservation mode. The Next Reservation card is hidden in Process Monitor mode.
Use the header buttons
The three buttons in the top-right corner are visible on every tab.
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| Save | Writes every setting on every tab to the config file. The button reads Saved! for a moment. A running lock screen picks the change up immediately. |
| Test | Launches the lock screen (SimLock.exe) so you can see your settings. Same as Test Lock Screen at the bottom of the Dashboard. |
| Lock Kiosk | Ends maintenance mode, restores kiosk hardening, launches (or wakes) the lock screen and closes the Admin panel. See below. |
Lock Kiosk discards unsaved changes
Lock Kiosk asks you to confirm. It does not save first. Click Save before Lock Kiosk if you changed anything.
Activate the licence
The LICENSE card shows License Status: followed by Not Activated (red) or Activated (green), and your Machine ID underneath.
To activate:
- Type the email address you bought SimLock with into the box.
- Click Check License. The button reads Checking... while it talks to the licence server.
- On success the status turns to Activated, the email box is replaced by your address and a Deactivate button, and the card may show (Remaining: N) activations left on that licence.
If activation fails, the card shows the server's reason, or (Available: N) plus the message when the licence has no free seats. A network problem reads Network error: Unable to reach activation server or Connection timeout: Activation server did not respond.
To move the licence to another PC, click Deactivate and confirm. This frees one activation for use on another machine. The card reads Deactivated successfully and then returns to Not Activated. See Licensing for seat counts and offline behaviour.
Read the status cards
| Card | Shows |
|---|---|
| OPERATING MODE | Process Monitor with Monitoring <process>.exe, or Reservation with Calendar-driven kiosk. Change it on the General tab. |
| LAST CALENDAR SYNC | How long ago the calendar was polled (30s ago, 4m ago, 2h ago) and how many events it returned. Reads Never with Connect Google Calendar if Reservation mode has not synced yet, or Reservation mode disabled in Process Monitor mode. |
| CUSTOMERS | How many customers are in the database. Click the card to jump to the Customers tab. |
| NEXT RESERVATION | Reservation mode only. The attendee name and start time of the next event on this bay's calendar, or — with No upcoming events. An event with no attendee name shows (unnamed). |
Sync shows Never but you are connected
The poller writes a sync time after every attempt, even a failed one, so Never means the Monitor has not polled at all. Check that SimLock Monitor is running (tray icon) and that the mode was saved as Reservation. If the time updates but the count stays at 0 events, check that This Bay is selected on the Calendar tab; with nothing selected in either list the status reads error: no calendars selected.
Watch the activity feed
RECENT ACTIVITY lists the last 25 events the kiosk logged, newest first, and refreshes every 5 seconds. Each line has a relative time (12s ago, 3m ago, 5h ago, or a date), a coloured dot and the message. A green dot is informational, amber is a warning and red is an error. Until the kiosk has done anything the panel reads No activity yet.
Typical entries are calendar syncs and sync errors, customer lookups and arrivals, session launches and stops, reservation screens appearing, maintenance ending, and mode changes. When a customer says "it did not work", this feed is the first place to look. See Troubleshooting.
Relock the kiosk after maintenance
When a manager uses the Manager Override button on the lock screen, the kiosk stays unlocked with hardening relaxed until someone relocks it. Lock Kiosk is the way to do that from the Admin panel:
- Click Lock Kiosk in the header.
- Confirm Lock the kiosk now?
- SimLock clears the maintenance flag, re-applies the kiosk hardening policies, starts the lock screen (or brings back one that is hidden behind a running session) and closes the Admin panel.
The same thing is available from the SimLock Monitor tray icon: right-click and choose Launch Lock Screen. The activity feed records Maintenance ended from Admin panel (Lock Kiosk); hardening restored.
If SimLock.exe is missing next to the Admin panel, the panel tells you so. Maintenance is still ended, and in Reservation mode the Monitor relaunches the lock screen on its next tick.