Folder permissions

Folder permissions restrict who can see, use, and manage folders. Regardless of the permissions you set, other database administrators will always have the ability to manage all folders.

There are three main levels of folder permissions:

• Only me – Only you can see, use, and manage the folder.
• Everyone – All users can see, use, and manage the folder.
• Custom – You can define specific access to the folder. 

If you select Custom, there are four levels of custom permissions:

• None – Users cannot see that the folder exists.
• View – Users can see the folder and what documents are in it.
• Use – Users can add documents to or remove documents from the folder.
• Manage – Users can delete the folder, add subfolders, and configure the folder permissions.

Folder permissions are particularly useful if folders are used by different parts of the case team. You can hide folders that are irrelevant to other members of the team, ensuring they are not distracted or confused by folders they don’t need.

Folder permissions and document permissions

Folder permissions only control access to the folder, not to the documents in that folder.

For example, say you create the folder Depositions, set the permissions to only me, and then add 250 documents to that folder. Those 250 documents are still accessible to any user with the appropriate document permissions, despite the documents being in your folder. However, other users will not see your Depositions folder when they browse the database’s folder tree.

User-level folder permissions outrank role-level permissions

You can give folder permissions to both users and roles. If a user and that user’s role have two different permission levels to a folder, the user’s permissions outrank the role’s permissions.

For example, say you create the folder Depositions, set the permissions for the reviewer role to view only, and set the permissions for a single user, Gayle, to None.

Later, Gayle is given the role Reviewer. While all other reviewers can see the folder, she will not be able to see it until you remove her individual folder permissions.

New users automatically receive their role’s folder permissions

As soon as a new user is given a role, they will get the folder permissions for their role. If their role does not have specific permissions for a folder, they will get the permissions in the All other users field.

For example, Maria is a new DISCO user. Before she joined the team, the reviewer role was given Use permissions for the folder Expert Witness.

As soon as Maria is given the reviewer role, she will be able to manage the Expert Witness folder.

In the Deposition Prep for Vince Kaminski folder, however, no specific permissions have been given to the reviewer role or to Maria individually.

In this folder, the permission level for All other users is None. Since neither Maria nor her role has specific permissions for this folder, she will fall into the category of all other users. She will not be able to view or use the Deposition Prep for Vince Kaminski folder.

Folder permissions are not inherited in the folder hierarchy

If you have permissions for a folder, you will not automatically have access to the folders above and below it in the folder hierarchy.

If you have access to a parent folder and not the subfolders, you will not see the subfolders. You will be unable to delete the parent folder, since doing so would delete the subfolders you don’t have permissions to delete.

If you have access to a subfolder and not the parent folder, you will see a placeholder icon and the hierarchy of folders, but the parent folder names will not be revealed.

For example, in the following folder hierarchy, you have the following permissions:

When browsing folders, this is what you would see:

In addition, you can only delete folders when you have manage permissions. Deleting a folder automatically deletes all of its subfolders. This means that if you have manage permissions for a folder but do not have manage permissions for a subfolder, you will be unable to delete either folder.

Folder permissions are available on all databases created after April 2, 2018.

For more information, see Adding permissions to folders and Document permissions.