VMware View supports Kiosk Mode which transparently connects a locked-down endpoint, typically a thin or zero client directly to a virtual desktop session. When using Kiosk Mode, users are not required to manually launch a VMware View Client and enter credentials as all configuration and provisioning is executed in background when the endpoint is powered on and the user is presented with a familiar interface; a dedicated kiosk virtual desktop session or application.

Configuring Kiosk Mode does require some additional configuration steps on the View Connection Server. Specifically, the command-line utility vdmadmin must be used to enable kiosk mode and to create AD accounts. You can create kiosk accounts based on the MAC address of the endpoint but in this example, I have chosen not to do so. VMware View requires that all AD accounts to be used for kiosk mode authentication begin with “custom-“.

1. To enable kiosk mode authentication of clients for the View Connection Server VCS01, allowing clients with automatically generated passwords to authenticate themselves without providing a password, execute the following command from a View Connection Server:

vdmadmin –Q –enable –s VCS01

2. To create an Active Directory “custom” account, execute the following command:

vdmadmin –Q –clientauth –add –domain MYDOMAINNAME –clientid “custom-public” –password “SomePassword”

3. You can get a list of those kiosk mode accounts already created by running the command:

vdmadmin –Q –clientauth -list

You get an output similar to the following:

4. Finally, you’ll likely have some configuration to do on your endpoint device. Newer VMware View zero clients like the Samsung NC190 have the capability to configure Kiosk Mode in their device configuration screens as shown below: