Assigning Permissions to a Discussion Board

Like regular content folders, Discussion Boards have a permission table that lets you determine which users can perform which functions. (To learn more about folder permissions, see Folder Permissions.) Because Discussion Boards have different functions than folders, their permission table is slightly different.

In addition, each Forum has permission settings. By default, a Forum inherits permissions from its parent Discussion Board. But, you can break this inheritance and customize permissions for a Forum. If you break a Forum’s inheritance, only the Forum’s permission table is checked -- the parent Discussion Board’s permissions are ignored.

Modifying a Discussion Board’s Permission Table

To access a Discussion Board’s permission table, navigate to and click the board so it appears in the Workarea. Then, click View > Permissions.

Note: Only Administrators group members can access the Discussion Board Permission Table.

See Screen Sample

Below is an example of a Discussion Board permission table for regular users. Membership users have fewer permissions. See Also: Discussion Board Permissions

See Screen Sample

Initialization of Discussion Board Permission Values

When you create a Discussion Board, Ektron CMS400.NET seeds its permission table with values from the parent folder, as described in the following table.

Parent Folder Permission	Discussion Board Permission
Read only	Read only
Edit	Edit Topic
Add	Add Topic
Delete	Delete Topic
Add Folders	Add Forum
Edit Folders	Edit Forum
Delete Folders	Delete Forum

Note: Because there are no corresponding permissions for the Discussion Board’s Moderate and Post/reply permissions, their initial value is blank.

So for example, if the user JSmith has permission to perform all functions for a folder, and a Discussion Board is created in that folder, JSmith initially receives all permissions listed above for the Discussion Board. However, you can edit the permissions as needed.

As soon as you create a Discussion Board, it is disconnected from the parent folder’s permission table. Subsequent changes to the parent’s permissions have no effect on Discussion Board permissions.

Discussion Board Permissions

The following table lists all permissions that may be granted to regular users. Only some permissions can be granted to membership users (that is, site visitors who register to participate in the Forum).

Permission	Give the user ability to	Can be assigned to membership users	For more information, see
Read only	View Forums and posts; cannot submit a post	Yes
Edit Topic	Edit a topic’s title	No	Editing a Topic's Title
Add Topic	Add new topics	Yes	Adding a Topic to a Forum
Delete Topic	Delete a topic	No	Deleting a Topic
Post/Reply	Post a new topic or reply to an existing one, either from the Workarea or the site	Yes	Adding a Topic to a Forum; Replying to a Post
Moderate Warning! Everyone who has Moderate permission will receive notifications when a post is reported. See Also: Reporting a Post	Approve and delete posts and topics. Also, receive notifications when a post is reported using the report post feature; only applicable if the Forum’s Properties field Moderate Comments is checked.	Yes	Moderate Comments
Add Forum	Create a new Forum	No	Creating a Forum
Edit Forum	Edit a Forum	No	Editing a Forum
Delete Forum	Delete a Forum	No	Deleting a Forum

Discussion Forum Permissions for Membership Users

By default, membership users are assigned the following permissions:

Read only

Add Topic

Post Reply

They cannot be granted Edit or Delete topic nor advanced permissions (Add, Edit or Delete Forum). However, if a membership user creates a new topic, he can delete it.

To change the default permissions, follow these steps.

1. Navigate to and click the Discussion Board so it appears in the Workarea.

2. Click View > Permissions.

3. Click the User Type dropdown field and choose Membership Users.

See Screen Sample

4. The View Permissions for Board screen appears.

5. Add new member users and groups, remove them, or change their permissions.

Granting Discussion Board Permissions

To give a CMS user or user group permissions to work with a Discussion Board, follow these steps.

1. Navigate to and click the Discussion Board so it appears in the Workarea.

2. Click View > Permissions.

3. Click Add ().

4. All users and groups who are not currently assigned permissions appear. Click any user or group.

5. The Add Permission for Folder screen appears with the selected user or group.

6. Assign appropriate standard and advanced permissions then click Save (). See Also: Assigning Permissions to a Discussion Board

Removing Discussion Board Permissions

To remove a user or user group from the Discussion Board permission table, follow these steps. After you remove a user, Discussion Boards do not appear in his Workarea.

1. Navigate to and click the Discussion Board so it appears in the Workarea.

2. Click View > Permissions.

3. Click Delete ().

4. Select a user or group that you want to remove from the Permission table.

5. A confirmation message. Click OK.

6. The user is removed.

Editing Discussion Board Permissions

To edit a user or user group’s Discussion Board permissions, follow these steps.

1. Navigate to and click the Discussion Board so it appears in the Workarea.

2. Click View > Permissions.

3. Click the user or group whose permissions you want to edit.

4. The Edit Permissions screen appears.

5. Change the settings as appropriate. See Also: Discussion Board Permissions

6. Click Save ().

Assigning User Permissions to Forums

You can use all of the permission features available to Discussion Boards with any Forum. To access a Forum’s Permission Table, follow these steps.

1. Open CMS Workarea > Content.

2. Click the Forum.

3. Click View Permissions on the Contents of Forum screen (circled below).

4. A Permission Table appears. See Also: Discussion Board Permissions

Setting a Forum’s Permission Table Values

A Forum initially inherits (that is, copies all permissions from) its parent Discussion Board’s permission settings.

When you first view a Forum’s permission table, you see these settings plus a check box that allows you to maintain the inheritance or break it (circled above).

If you break inheritance by unchecking the Allow this object to inherit permissions box, the Forum permission screens change from view-only to edit. At this point, you can modify the Forum’s permissions as needed.

To later restore inheritance, check the box. When you do, the parent Discussion Board’s permissions overwrite any Forum-specific changes. The Forum then reverts to a read-only state. Any permission changes must be made at the Discussion Board level while inheritance is enabled.