Minimum permissions needed to view files in a PDM vault

There are many permissions that can be set in a PDM vault. But the goal of this article will be to spell out the minimum permissions a user will need just to be able to see the files.

As with most permissions in the vault, you will need to look in two locations to find everything you need to let users view files. They are the Folder permissions, and the State permissions. Both of which can be set at the User or Group levels.

Folder Permissions:

First, we'll take a look at the Folder permissions. There are two permissions that need to be set at the folder level. They are:

Read file contents - Allows users to see files and folders under the selected folder

Show working versions of files - Allows users to see versions of files that don't have a revision explicitly applied

Below are the instructions for setting these permissions at the user level, but they can also be set in a group.

*In these instructions we will be selecting the vault root because all users should, at minimum, have the ability to view everything at that level. Because these permissions are inherited by sub folders, you should remove these permissions for any folders the user shouldn't have access to.

1. Open the PDM Administration tool and expand the vault

2. Log in with the Admin account, or another account with full administrative permissions in the vault

3. Expand the Users section

4. Right click on the user you want to edit and select Open

5. In the Folder Permissions section, select vault root in the folder list and check the boxes for the 'Read file contents' and 'Show working versions of files' permissions.

6. Click OK to save the settings and exit

State Permissions:

Next we will look at the State permissions. There's only one permission that needs to be set at the State level. It is:

Read file contents - Allows users to see files currently in the selected state

As with the Folder permissions, the following instructions are for setting the permissions at the User level, but they can also be set in a group.

1. Open the PDM Administration tool and expand the vault

2. Log in with the Admin account, or another account with full administrative permissions in the vault

3. Expand the Users section

4. Right click on the user you want to edit and select Open

5. In the State Permissions section, if you have more than one workflow, you will first need to select the appropriate workflow from the dropdown list in the upper right corner of the Properties window

* If the user should have access to files in other workflows, you will have to repeat the following steps for the states in the other workflows as well.

6. In the 'Workflow states' section, select the states the user should be able to see files in. You can Ctrl + select individual states, or box select all states.

7. In the 'Permissions' section, check the box for the 'Read file contents' permission.

8. Click OK to save the settings and exit

Users should now be able to see all the files in the vault.