Custom Logon (Industry 8.1)

  • Article

7/8/2014

Learn how to add Custom Logon settings to your Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry (Industry 8.1) image.

In Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry (Industry 8.1), you can suppress Windows 8.1 UI elements that relate to the Welcome screen and shutdown screen. For example, you can suppress all elements of the Welcome screen UI and provide a Custom Logon UI. You can also suppress the Blocked Shutdown Resolver (BSDR) screen and automatically end applications while the OS waits for applications to close before a shutdown.

Custom Logon settings do not modify the credential behavior of Winlogon, so you can use any credential provider that is compatible with Windows 8.1 to provide a custom sign-in experience for your device.

You must configure Custom Logon settings at design time by adding the settings to the answer file. You cannot change the configuration of Custom Logon during run time.

Add Custom Logon settings to your image

To add Custom Logon settings to your image during the design phase, use Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM) to add the appropriate values to your answer file. For more information about Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM), see Migrate from Windows Embedded 8 Industry.

Custom Logon settings

The following table shows the Custom Logon settings and their possible values.

Setting

Description

AnimationDisabled

Contains an integer that specifies whether the Welcome screen transition animation is disabled for Custom Logon.

Set to 1 to disable the animation; otherwise; set to 0 (zero). The default value is 0.

BrandingNeutral

Contains an integer that specifies which UI elements display on the Welcome screen.

The default value is 17.The following table shows the possible values. You can combine these values using bitwise exclusive-or logic to disable multiple Welcome screen UI elements.

ValueDescription
1Disables all Welcome screen UI elements.
2Disables the Power button.
4Disables the Language button.
8Disables the Ease of access button.
16Disables the Switch user button.
32Disables the Blocked Shutdown Resolver (BSDR) screen so that restarting or shutting down the system causes the OS to immediately force close any open applications that are blocking system shut down. No UI is displayed, and users are not given a chance to cancel the shutdown process. This can result in lost data if any open applications have unsaved data.

HideAutoLogonUI

This setting contains an integer that specifies whether to hide or show the Welcome screen when automatic sign-in is enabled.

Set to 1 to hide the Welcome screen; otherwise, set to 0 (zero). The default value is 0.

By default, Custom Logon launches directly into the shell without displaying the sign-in UI when automatic sign-in is enabled. You can disable this option to mirror a Windows 8.1 experience, which briefly shows the sign-in UI before switching to the shell.

NoLockScreen

This setting contains an integer that specifies whether the Lock screen functionality and UI elements are enabled.

Set to 1 to disable the Lock screen on a device; otherwise, set to 0 (zero). The default value is 0.

UIVerbosityLevel

This setting contains a hexadecimal value that specifies whether Windows status messages are enabled during device startup, sign-in, and shut down.

Set to 0x1 to disable Windows sign-in status messages on a device; otherwise, set to 0x40 to enable Windows sign-in status messages. The default value is 0x0.

Example of Custom Logon

The following example shows how to disable all Welcome screen UI elements and the Switch user button.

<settings pass="specialize">
    <component name="Microsoft-Windows-Embedded-EmbeddedLogon" processorArchitecture="x86" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
      <BrandingNeutral>17</BrandingNeutral>
      <AnimationDisabled>1</AnimationDisabled>
      <NoLockScreen>1</NoLockScreen>
      <UIVerbosityLevel>1</UIVerbosityLevel>
      <HideAutoLogonUI>1</HideAutoLogonUI>
    </component>
</settings>

Troubleshooting

This section highlights some common issues that you may encounter when using Custom Logon.

When automatic sign-in is enabled, the device asks for a password when resuming from sleep or hibernate

This can occur when your device is configured to require a password when waking up from a sleep state.

To disable password protection on wake up

  1. If you have write filters enabled on your device, perform the following steps to disable them so that you can save setting changes:

    1. At an administrator command prompt, type the following command:

      uwfmgr.exe filter disable

    2. To restart the device, type the following command:

      uwfmgr.exe restart

  2. In Control Panel, select Power Options.

  3. In the Power Options item, click Require a password on wakeup.

  4. On the Define power buttons and turn on password protection page, under Password protection on wakeup, select Don’t require a password.

  5. If you disabled write filters, perform the following steps to enable them again:

    1. At an administrator command prompt, type the following command:

      uwfmgr.exe filter enable

    2. To restart the device, type the following command:

      uwfmgr.exe restart

The device displays a black screen during setup

Set the HideAutoLogonUI and AnimationDisabled settings to 0 (zero). The device will then display a default screen during setup.

The device displays a black screen when Ctrl+Alt+Del is pressed

HideAutoLogonUI and ForceAutoLogon have known issues when used together. To avoid a black screen, we recommend you use Keyboard Filter to block this key combination.

The device displays a black screen when Windows key + L is used to lock the device

HideAutoLogonUI and ForceAutoLogon have known issues when used together. To avoid a black screen, we recommend you use Keyboard Filter to block this key combination.

The device displays a black screen when Notepad is opened, any characters are typed and the current user signs out, or the device is rebooted, or the device is shut down

HideAutoLogonUI and ForceAutoLogon have known issues when used together. To avoid a black screen, we recommend you disable the Blocked Shutdown Resolver Screen (BSDR).

Warning

When the BSDR screen is disabled, restarting or shutting down the device causes the OS to immediately force close any open applications that are blocking system shutdown. No UI is displayed, and users are not given a chance to cancel the shutdown process. This can result in lost data if any open applications have unsaved data.

The device displays a black screen when the device is suspended and then resumed

HideAutoLogonUI and ForceAutoLogon have known issues when used together. To avoid a black screen, we recommend you disable the password protection on wakeup.

To disable password protection on wakeup

  1. In Control Panel, click Power Options.

  2. In the Power Options item, click Require a password on wakeup.

  3. On the Define power buttons and turn on password protection page, under Password protection on wakeup, select Don’t require a password.

The device displays a black screen when a password expiration screen is displayed

HideAutoLogonUI has a known issue. To avoid a black screen, we recommend you set the password to never expire.

To set a password to never expire on an individual user account

  1. On your device, open a command prompt with administrator privileges.

  2. Type the following, replacing <accountname> with the name of the account you want to remove the password expiration from.

    net accounts <accountname> /expires:never

To passwords to never expire on all user accounts

  1. On your device, open a command prompt with administrator privileges.

  2. Type the following

    net accounts /MaxPWAge:unlimited

See Also

Concepts

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