Defining Document Collaboration Permissions

Collaboration Permissions is a feature that gives you a fine-grained permission system for defining actions allowed by individual users when multiple users are working on the same document.

Collaboration permissions allow a user to:

  • View an annotation or comment.

  • Edit an annotation or comment.

  • Delete an annotation or comment.

  • Reply to a comment thread.

These permissions are based on the configuration present in the JSON Web Token (JWT). Since these permissions can’t be modified on the client side, they’re more secure than the previously existing client-side restrictions.

See the permissions syntax in the Setting User Collaboration Permissions guide for information on how to configure the permissions from Document Engine.

Collaboration Permissions doesn’t handle the creation of annotations or comments. Such permissions are granted by specifying the write permission in the permissions array in the JWT.

If Collaboration Permissions is enabled, by default, a user isn’t allowed to perform any of the actions unless specified.

Licensing

Permissions are available to all users who have Instant enabled in their license.

Example

You can use the Collaboration Permissions Example from our PSPDFKit Catalog to start a new collaboration session. You can then share the document session link and join as a different user using our examples in a web browser.

Steps:

  1. Run the Catalog app and open the Collaboration Permissions Example.

  2. Select a user to start the collaboration session as that user.

  3. Tap the Collaborate button.

  4. Tap Share Document Link.

  5. Open the document link in a web browser and you’ll be prompted to opt for the user you’d like to add to the collaboration session.