Who Sees Discussions?

A discussion can be created within any particular content item (document, questionnaire, or campaign). Which users are allowed to view and participate in a discussion depends on several factors, including the content item's current status, users' ability to access the content item by virtue of their assigned roles and permissions, and the current Content Setup settings, which are controlled by your PolicyTech administrator.

All Discussions

For any particular content item, those with the following roles have access to and complete control over all of that content item's discussions:

Any administrator assigned to the site containing the content item
The content item's owner
A proxy author assigned to the content item

This control includes the ability to do the following:

Create new discussions
Select any other user as a discussion participant

Note: Selecting a user does not change that user's permission to access the content item in any way. If the added participant can already access the content item by virtue of an assigned role or permission, that user will be able to open the item and see the new discussion. If the user cannot currently access the content item, the user still receives an email notification with the discussion's original text and a link to the item, but clicking the link goes to an "access to resource denied" message.

View and participate in (reply to) all discussions, including those marked private, in any workflow status
Change a discussion's security level from private to public and from public to private
Delete any discussion

Public Discussions for Content Items in the Draft, Collaboration, Review, and Approval Statuses

Discussions function differently in the statuses before a content item is approved (Draft, Collaboration, Review, and Approval) than they do in the post-approval statuses (Pending and Published/Started). What users can do with a content item's discussions in the earlier statuses also depends on whether or not they are assigned a task to write, review, or approve the content item.

Note: For details on what assigned owners and proxy authors can do with discussions, see All Discussions above.

A content item's assigned writers, reviewers, and approvers can do the following with that item's discussions:

Create new discussions
Select any other accessible user as a discussion participant

View and participate in all public discussions created in the assigned content item while it is in any accessible workflow status
Change a discussion's security level from private to public and from public to private
Delete a discussion that the user initially created

Owners, writers, reviewers, and approvers can also do the following with any unrestricted content item that they are not assigned to while the item is in any accessible status:

Create new discussions that only an administrator and the assigned owner and proxy authors can see.
View and participate in a discussion that the user initially created. In other words, unassigned owners, writers, reviewers, and approvers cannot view any discussions created by anyone else and cannot remove default participants or select additional participants.

For example, a user assigned the approver role can see all unrestricted content items (those assigned the All Users security level) while they are in the Approval status. This includes unrestricted content items the user is not assigned to approve. In an accessible, unrestricted content item, an unassigned approver can create a new discussion that automatically includes only the assigned owner, any assigned proxy author's, and any administrator with access to that content item.

Public Discussions for Content Items in the Pending and Published/Started Statuses

After a content item is approved, writers, reviewers, and approvers assigned to that content item can see all public discussions, including those previously created in the Draft, Collaboration, Review, and Approval statuses.

Note: For details on what assigned owners and proxy authors can do with discussions within pending and published content items, see All Discussions above.

The following users can see a content item's discussions created in the Pending and Published statuses but cannot see those previously created in the Draft, Collaboration, Review, and Approval statuses, unless they were added as a participant in one or more of those discussions:

Owners, proxy authors, writers, reviewers, and approvers who are NOT assigned to the content item
All users with the Assignee role, including those designated as assignees for the content item

Private Discussions

When a content item discussion is marked private, only those explicitly selected as recipients, administrators, the owner, and any assigned proxy authors can view the discussion.

Note: If selected recipients are removed from the recipient list for a private discussion, they will no longer be able to see that discussion, even if they previously contributed to it.

Discussion Notifications

If an administrator has set up PolicyTech to send out email notifications using your organization's email system, emails will be sent to selected or default participants each time a discussion is created or replied to.

Note: When a user doesn't have the option to select participants, the default recipients who receive email notifications are the owner, any assigned proxy authors, and any administrators with administrative permission for the content item's site.

It is important to understand that email notification for a discussion has nothing to do with whether the recipient has access to the content item containing the discussion. If a user without the role or permission necessary to access a content item is included as a discussion recipient and receives an email notification, that user can open the email and see the text from the discussion, but clicking the content item link will result in a message saying that access to the requested content item is denied.