Release Notes
October 9, 2024

The GoGuardian App on Windows Release Notes

GoGuardian App

The GoGuardian App on Windows Release Notes

1.12.2


October 8, 2024

New

  • Added Pearson application domains and subdomains to Application Exceptions in Organization Management > Installation > The GoGuardian App > Manage Exceptions  > Application Exceptions > Pearson. The domains and subdomains include:
    • *.actaspire.org
    • *.actonline.act.org
    • *.testnav.com

Changed

  • Expanded screenshots to capture the entire desktop on Windows devices. It requires The GoGuardian App 1.12.2 or later and a device restart. 
  • GoGuardian Admin policies no longer treat "www" as a subdomain in URLs on The GoGuardian App deployments.

1.11.2


August 29, 2024

New

  • Released Teacher Override, letting teachers temporarily override blocks set up in GoGuardian Admin during classroom sessions. Please read our "Teacher Override" support article for mroe information.
  • Improved cross-origin (CORS) handling, specifically reworked Content Security Policy (CSP) code to minimally modify CSP headers and resolve CORS errors.
  • Added the ability to capture page titles for GoGuardian Admin Smart Alerts, which will now show in the Smart Alerts card as Website Title.


Fixed

  • Unable to close the Beacon student message on Google searches.
  • Beacon student messages appear broken or blank on Yahoo searches.
  • Continued improvements to CSP-related issues that prevent website resources from loading.


Changed

  • Changed The GoGuardian App hostname rules to match the GoGuardian extensions. When users block a domain or subdomain, it now prevents access to all endpoints without requiring a trailing wildcard. For example, docs.google.com blocks all Google Docs file URLs.

1.10.2


July 30, 2024

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug causing Teacher Allow Scenes to not limit YouTube videos to only the specified URL until the page is refreshed.

1.9.2


July 1, 2024

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug preventing users from connecting to a captive portal when The GoGuardian App is installed on the device.

1.8.4


June 24, 2024

New

  • Added two registry keys, StartMinimizedToSystemTray=true and MinimizeToSystemTray=true, for minimizing The GoGuardian App to the app tray on startup. Please note that StartMinimizedToSysemTray will be ignored if MinimizeToSystemTray is not set to true.
  • Added support for hardcoding generic users on Windows deployments via two new keys, REGISTRY and AD_ATTRIBUTE. Please contact your GoGuardian Account Manager for more information.
  • Launched GoGuardian-branded ADMX templates for Active Directory and Intune deployments. Please download them in Organization Management and ask your Account Manager for more information.
  • Updated the DisableIdentityCache key to disable user caching on SAML and SSO sign-ins, prompting users to sign in when DisableIdentityCache=true and IdentitySources=None.

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug slowing predictive search in Google.
  • Fixed a bug causing users signed in via Google SAML to sign out when the Windows device is signed out of or restarted. This forced users to sign in again eachtime.
  • Fixed the tab order and background color on the student privacy bubble message to meet accessibility standards.
  • Fixed a bug causing the GoGuardian Security certificate to remain on the device after uninstalling The GoGuardian App.
  • Fixed a bug causing students to show offline in GoGuardian Teacher.

1.7.4


May 2, 2024

New

  • Improved The GoGuardian App .msi and .intunewin packages for easier installation, troubleshooting, and maintenance. This adds a new background process, GoGuardianElevationService, in Task Manager.
  • Added support for minimizing The GoGuardian App to the app tray.

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug causing Windows to report insufficient memory when uninstalling The GoGuardian App.
  • Fixed a bug causing the GoGuardian Security certificate not to install when battery saver is enabled on Windows.
  • Fixed a bug causing students to show offline after an extended time in GoGuardian Teacher.
  • Fixed a bug that violates Content Security Policy, resulting in some websites not loading inline resources.

1.6.2


March 21, 2024

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug causing the GoGuardian Teacher Lock Device command to not persist through device restart.
  • Fixed a bug causing tabs opened before a GoGuardian Teacher session to not show in the student tile.
  • Improved the alerting of WikiHow searches via GoGuardian Admin Smart Alerts.

1.5.2


February 15, 2024

New

  • Improved accessibility by adding descriptions, labels, and drop-shadow contrast.

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug causing some sub-page services and resources to be missing from Diagnostics in Organization Management.
  • Fixed a bug allowing YouTube filtering bypasses via the Preview feature in Google Mail (Gmail) and Google Docs.
  • Fixed a bug allowing users to close the GoGuardian Teacher Lock Device command.
  • Fixed a bug preventing the proxy from filtering web requests of users who sign in via Switch User.
  • Fixed a bug causing five-second delays for web requests made in Mozilla Firefox.
  • Fixed a bug preventing The GoGuardian App from attempting to sign web requests with an expired certificate.

1.4.4


January 16, 2024

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug causing some websites to return empty responses on connections over HTTP/2 protocol.

1.4.2


January 12, 2024

New

  • Increased accessibility by improving element headers and focus for screen readers and supporting alternative input methods (e.g., keyboard navigation).
  • General improvements and fixes.

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug allowing users to log in with the previous user's cached Google credentials at the single sign-on (SSO) screen.
  • Fixed a bug causing the default browser to continuously reopen when a user closes it out during SSO authentication.

Changed

  • For GoGuardian Admin Website URLs and Website Categories, the proxy is now enforced only on HTML responses. This reduces excessive blocks, latency, and the frequency of manually exempting websites.

1.2.2


October 2, 2023

New

  • Improved alternative text for accessibility.
  • Made backend improvements to better support Mozilla Firefox.
  • On Active Directory deployments, bypass all filtering for specific users in multi-user environments with a registry key.


Fixed

  • Fixed a bug that caused the privacy bubble to show for students during out-of-school hours.

1.1.4


August 17, 2023

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug allowing users to bypass The GoGuardian App once per device by manually turning off the proxy. The fix automatically turns the proxy on again in Settings > Network & Internet > Proxy.

1.1.2


August 7, 2023

New

  • Released Teacher for Windows via The GoGuardian App.
  • Updated The GoGuardian App .msi and .intunewin files to automatically allow the app in the Windows Defender firewall during installation.
  • Created a service to auto-restart The GoGuardian App when it closes or crashes.
  • Hardcoded new Google domains for single sign-on (SSO).
  • Hardcoded Workspace ONE (formerly AirWatch) hostnames.
  • Added support for spaces and special characters in the GoGuardian Security certificate.
  • Added validation to ignore invalid emails and fall back to single sign-on (SSO).
  • Built a mechanism to retry the GoGuardian Security certificate's installation up to five times when the certificate fails to install or is removed.


Changed

  • Updated the install-certificate file to look for the certificate's exact path in the Windows Event Log event that registers when The GoGuardian App starts.
  • Changed logic to look for the user's unique SHA-1 hash in the GoGuardian Security certificate.


Fixed

  • Fixed a behavior preventing the GoGuardian Security certificate from being installed. The certificate is now in the .msi and .intunewin packages.
  • Fixed a behavior that caused students to show offline in Teacher if The GoGuardian App runs for more than 100 minutes.
  • Fixed a bug that caused students to show offline in Teacher when the Wi-Fi was disconnected and reconnected.
  • Fixed a behavior that caused delays of screenshots in student tiles on Teacher.
  • Fixed a bug that created erroneous logs for expected behaviors in The GoGuardian App.
  • Fixed a bug where a block page can show when Admin filtering is disabled.
  • Fixed a bug that caused the GoGuardian Security certificate to show TLS errors.
  • Fixed a behavior letting users see the foremost window despite the Teacher Lock Screen command applied.

1.0.64


July 13, 2023

Fixed

  • Fixed a behavior causing unresponsiveness in The GoGuardian App's user interface (UI).
  • Fixed a bug that caused foreign sites to throw privacy warnings due to The GoGuardian App misidentifying the top-level domain.
  • Fixed a bug that caused the "Next" button in the single sign-on (SSO) screen to not work.

1.0.60


April 19, 2023

Fixed

  • Fixed a bug that caused the desktop version of YouTube.com to freeze.

1.0.58


February 8, 2023

Fixed

  • Admin and Beacon no longer take screenshots of Bing.com but continue to filter it.

Additional Product Updates

GoGuardian Beacon
October 1, 2024
After-Hours Email Summary
GoGuardian Teacher
October 1, 2024
Flexible Scheduling for Every Classroom
GoGuardian Teacher
August 30, 2024
Teacher-initiated Filter Override
GoGuardian Beacon
May 20, 2024
Snoozing Active Planning Alerts
GoGuardian Admin
July 12, 2024
Streamlined Smart Alerts Interface for Easier Management
GoGuardian Admin
June 13, 2024
Enhancements to Filtering Simulator