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Enable Safe Exam Browser from within your digital test

Brooke Henshall
  • Updated

Safe Exam Browser is a web browser environment that allows digital tests carried out safely. Safe Exam Browser software turns any computer temporarily into a secure workstation. It controls and restricts access to system functions, other websites and applications and prevents unauthorised resources from being used during an exam.

Safe Exam Browser can now be configured from within your digital test. This includes which special and function keys are allowed to be used, which settings are allowed to be shown on the dock/taskbar, which processes are enabled and disabled while Safe Exam Browser is active and options to configure multiple behaviours of the system. 

To configure Safe Exam Browser from within your digital test, follow the steps below.

  1. Click the domain School name in the menu on the left.
  2. Click label_important Courses in the menu at the top.
  3. Select your course or use the search bar. 
  4. Select your assignment or use the search bar. 
  5. Click settings Settings in the menu at the top.
  6. Click the tab Integrations in the menu on the left.
  7. Click Enable next to Safe Exam Browser.
  8. Configure the settings that apply. 

Safari version 12 is the minimum requirement needed in order to run Safe Exam Browser with Ans.
Versions older than macOS Sierra are not supported.

You can read more about Safe Exam Browser specifications here.

Configuration Settings

The different configuration settings that are available in Ans are described below. Click on Update at the bottom of the page to save the configuration settings that apply to your assignment have been enabled. 

Special and function keys
Configure which special and function keys are allowed to be used. For example, if students are allowed to have multiple tabs open, you can check the 'Alt tab' so they can easily switch between tabs.

Dock/taskbar
Configure which settings are allowed to be shown on Safe Exam Browser dock/taskbar. Safe Exam Browser dock/taskbar is displayed at either the bottom or top of the page, depending on the operating system.

Please note that ‘Navigation buttons’ only work if the ‘Reload button’ is also enabled (not the other way around). We don't recommend using the navigation buttons, as Safe Exam Browser does not send their configuration key when using 'page_back'. This means students will get the error 'incorrect configuration detected' and they will need to go to the home page and go to resume test.

Text to speech (macOS only)
Check the box 'Text to speech is allowed' if the Readspeaker integration is also enabled for your digital test. Please note, that you will need to configure Readspeaker in the integrations. 

Exit Safe Exam Browser
If 'Allow the user to quit Safe Exam Browser' is checked, you can enter a password that students can use to quit Safe Exam Browser. If this option is not checked, students can only exit Safe Exam Browser after they have submitted their test.

URL filtering
If 'Enable URL filtering' is checked without extra filters, then every URL except for Ans' URLs will be blocked. You can configure which URLs are allowed by clicking ADD URL FILTER. You can then fill in the URLs you want to allow. To allow subdomains of an URL, add "/*" at the end of the URL. 

If 'Enable URL filtering' isn't checked at all (or it is but without any extra filters), the student is able to open a website from within an open question or the Digital Notes (when turned on). 

Files
If 'Allow downloading and uploading files is checked, then students are allowed to download and upload files during the test. After checking the box 'Allow downloading and uploading files, you can configure how uploading and downloading files will be handled.

  • Open download file
  • Search for a file, if not found, it will open the download file so you can search
  • Try searching for the file. If the file is not found, you will get an error

Permitted Processes
Configure which processes are allowed to continue running while Safe Exam browser is active. If you want to allow certain applications to run during the test, you can enable them here. You can read more about this option at Safeexambrowser.org.

Prohibited Processes
Configure which processes are disabled/blocked while Safe Exam browser is active. You can read more about this option at Safeexambrowser.org.

Link behaviour (macOS only)
This option is used if links are included in your digital test. By clicking the dropdown menu, you can configure the behaviour of the system when opening links.

As navigation buttons are not enabled by default, we recommend selecting 'Links open in a new window'. If you select 'Links open in the same window' and students open a link to a new website, they cannot go back to Ans.

View behaviour
By clicking the dropdown menu, you can configure how Safe Exam Browser will be viewed.

  • Use browser window - Opens the window, while still displaying the bar at the top, with limited options.
  • Use full-screen mode - Full screen, without the top bar.
  • Touch optimised.

Allowed versions
Configure which version of Safe Exam Browser can be used. To allow all versions, you can leave the boxes empty. You can specify the version with semantic versioning major.minor.patch. If the current version of Safe Exam Browser for Windows is 3.3.2 you can do the following:

  • 3 which will allow all versions starting with major 3 to be used (3.1.1, 3.3.2 and 3.4.0)
  • 3.3 which will allow all patch versions of 3.3 to be used (3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.3)
  • 3.3.2 which will only allow this specific version

If you don't want to allow the usage of an OS you can fill in anything that isn't a version. This means that if you don't want your students to use an IOS device, you can set the allowed version to 'x'.

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Click Update to save your configuration settings.

 

Actions

  • Download Configuration
    If you click Download, the Safe Exam Browser configuration will be downloaded and you can use the configuration in other digital tests.

Danger zone

  • Upload configuration
    Click Upload to upload your own configuration. The uploaded configuration may not be encrypted. 
  • Remove the Safe Exam Browser integration
    If you click Uninstall, the Safe Exam Browser integration is removed from your digital test. Participants can then access the test without Safe Exam Browser.

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