Roles & Permissions - HL Vanilla Community
<main> <article class="userContent"> <p>Two of the most important aspects of your <strong>Higher Logic Vanilla (Vanilla)</strong> community are <strong>Roles </strong>and <strong>permissions</strong>: </p><ul><li>Roles are like high-level categories in which your users are grouped.</li><li>Each Role can be customized with a unique set of permissions to control what users with that Role can see and do in your community.</li></ul><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: Every user must be assigned at least one Role.</p><p><strong>✔️ TIP</strong>: There are two important times to review your Roles and permissions: Prior to launching your Vanilla community, and when updating your community's settings.</p><h2 data-id="access-your-roles-and-permissions">Access your Roles and permissions</h2><p>1. Access the Dashboard. </p><p>2. Navigate to <strong>Settings > Membership > Roles and Permissions</strong>. </p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/CI7IYA8IBBRT/access-roles-perm.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/CI7IYA8IBBRT/access-roles-perm.png" alt="access_roles_perm.png" height="618" width="1318" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <p>On this page, you can:</p><ul><li>View your existing Roles</li><li>Create Roles</li><li>Edit and delete Roles</li></ul><p>Additionally, click the <strong>Advanced Settings</strong> button to <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/99-private-communities" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">enable Private Communities</a> and control what permission level is required to <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/282-expanding-user-sso-ids" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">expand the SSO ID permission via the API</a>.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/BDWEQRLLVEGQ/advanced-settings.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/BDWEQRLLVEGQ/advanced-settings.png" alt="advanced_settings.png" height="375" width="1036" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h2 data-id="note-for-customers-with-a-pending-migration">Note for customers with a pending migration</h2><p>During your test and final migrations, your current users and Roles will be imported into your production site.</p><p>Because Vanilla has its own feature set and will likely vary from your previous provider, you'll need to adjust the Roles and permissions. A best practice is to analyze and note these during the test migration, as they will be wiped out during the final migration and will need to be re-applied after the final migration. If you're unsure, contact your implementation project manager. </p><h2 data-id="notes-for-customers-using-sso">Notes for customers using SSO </h2><p>When using SSO, you can choose to pass Roles (or not). To learn more, see:</p><div class="js-embed embedResponsive" data-embedjson="{"body":"There are several ways that roles can be managed in Vanilla: Scenario 1: The mainsite or IDP controls the roles The mainsite or IDP has data on what roles that users should have, and will pass that over SSO to Vanilla. If a role needs to be changed, it should be done on the mainsite or within the IDP (outside of Vanilla)…","photoUrl":"https:\/\/us.v-cdn.net\/6030677\/uploads\/VWGAXAF5OFCO\/microsoftteams-image.png","url":"https:\/\/success.vanillaforums.com\/kb\/articles\/179-managing-roles-with-sso","embedType":"link","name":"Managing Roles with SSO - Vanilla Success"}"> <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/179-managing-roles-with-sso" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc"> https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/179-managing-roles-with-sso </a> </div><h2 data-id="roles">Roles</h2><p>Six default Roles are available: </p><ul><li>Guest</li><li>Unconfirmed</li><li>Applicant</li><li>Member</li><li>Moderator</li><li>Administrator</li></ul><p>What Roles you use will depend on your <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/303-registration-methods" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">registration settings</a>, where you are in the community lifecycle, and if you plan to use SSO.</p><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: If you're migrating from another platform, plan to use SSO, have a private community, or have a highly customized setup, your Roles may vary from those listed above.</p><h3 data-id="guest">Guest</h3><p>This is a special Role that represents non-logged in users in Vanilla. You can use this role to restrict what logged out users see when viewing your community.</p><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: Because Vanilla does not allow anonymous posting, this role cannot be given other permissions. </p><p>If you don't want Guests to be able to see your community (i.e., must be logged in to view), you can also enable <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/99-private-communities" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Private Communities</a>. If you set your community to private, only registered members will be able to view and post. If a user who is not logged accesses the community, they will see a login page (or be redirected to an SSO sign-in, if applicable). </p><p>Since search engines and their crawling bots are essentially Guest viewers, it’s important to understand that only content Guests are allowed to see will be indexed and appear in public search results (e.g., google, bing, etc.). If you set your community to private, or restrict view permissions for the Guest role, your community may not be indexed at all.</p><h3 data-id="unconfirmed">Unconfirmed</h3><p>If your community is using Vanilla-based registration (i.e., not SSO) and requires users to confirm their email, this Role will be given to users who have registered but have not yet confirmed their email address. </p><h3 data-id="applicant">Applicant</h3><p>If your community is using Vanilla-based registration (i.e., not SSO), and have the Approval method of registration enabled, this Role will be given to users who have applied for membership but have not yet been accepted by an admin or mod. By default, these users have the same permissions as Guests.</p><h3 data-id="member">Member</h3><p>Members can participate in discussions and access all end-user functionality.</p><h3 data-id="moderator">Moderator</h3><p>Moderators have permission to edit content and use the moderation features.</p><p>Your <strong>Moderators</strong> manage day-to-day life in your Vanilla community; they typically have permission to edit and curate content, review spam and moderation issues, and manage user accounts.</p><h3 data-id="administrator">Administrator</h3><p>Administrators have permission to do just about everything, including configuring your Vanilla account and creating Roles. Your <strong>Administrators</strong> are responsible for setting up your community, including creating accounts, configuring addons, managing Categories, and managing Themes.</p><h3 data-id="account-owner">Account Owner</h3><p>In addition to the six default Roles just discussed, the <strong>Account Owner</strong> Role is a special Role reserved for the main community administrator of your team. </p><ul><li>This Role does not show in the Dashboard</li><li>It is set up by Vanilla</li><li>Think of this Role as a <em>super admin</em> </li></ul><p><strong>✔️ TIP</strong>: DO NOT use this Role for permissions testing; it will supersede the assigned Roles and Permissions settings.</p><h2 data-id="default-types">Default Types</h2><p><strong>Default Types</strong> enable you to identify standard user types for specific aspects of your Vanilla community. </p><p><strong>⭐️ EXAMPLE</strong>: Some organizations might call their end users “Members” while others might call them “Registered Users.” Regardless of the name, Vanilla needs to understand what Roles represent the member-level user. Default Types are used to identify such roles (more on this below). </p><p><strong>Only assign a Default Type when necessary</strong>, as it will govern some default behaviors and permissions, such as assigning a member Role automatically upon registration (or once approved from the applicants’ queue, depending on registration type). For example, if you create a special "beta tester" role that should only have access to a special category, you would NOT want to give it the <strong>member </strong>Default Type, as it will assign any and all Roles with Member as the Default Type to users automatically upon registration, which may not be the desired behavior.</p><h3 data-id="default-type-member">Default Type - member</h3><p>The Default Type <strong>member </strong>dictates the Role(s) users are assigned upon registration. In other words, all Roles set to <strong>member </strong>will be auto-assigned to users when they complete registration.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/FL4F2UZ0BS2X/default-type-member.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/FL4F2UZ0BS2X/default-type-member.png" alt="default_type_member.png" height="535" width="1032" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h2 data-id="delete-a-role">Delete a Role</h2><p>1. Click the <strong>trashcan icon</strong> to its right.</p><p>2. In the resulting dialog, you'll be notified how many users will be affected by this deletion, and have the opportunity to move them to a different Role. If users have multiple Roles, this may not be necessary; however, if the Role being deleted is a user's <em>only </em>Role, it's important to give them a replacement Role granting member access or they will not be able to log in to your Vanilla community.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/EPSA2GQRURJH/delete-role.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/EPSA2GQRURJH/delete-role.png" alt="delete_role.png" height="716" width="1092" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h3 data-id="why-cant-i-delete-some-roles">Why can’t I delete some Roles?</h3><p>A few default Roles are needed for the infrastructure of certain community features and cannot be deleted: <strong>Guest</strong>, <strong>Unconfirmed </strong>and <strong>Applicant</strong>.</p><h2 data-id="edit-a-role">Edit a Role</h2><p>1. Click the <strong>pencil icon </strong>to its right.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/UFGM2AN595M2/edit-role.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/UFGM2AN595M2/edit-role.png" alt="edit_role.png" height="618" width="1040" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <p>2. On the resulting page, you can update basic Role details, like its name, description, and Default Type, as well as its permissions (more on permissions below).</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/892SCC1IDNS1/edit-role-details.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/892SCC1IDNS1/edit-role-details.png" alt="edit_role_details.png" height="576" width="1115" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h3 data-id="personal-info-option">Personal Info option</h3><p>A user's <em>email address</em> and <em>IP address </em>are considered "personal info," and are only visible to users with the <code class="code codeInline" spellcheck="false" tabindex="0">Garden > Personal Info > View</code> permission.</p><p>If you toggle the <strong>Personal Info</strong> option for a Role, it <em>also</em> becomes "personal info," essentially making it a "hidden" Role only visible to those with the same permission.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-medium float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/LLK425ZVFP8D/personal-info-example.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/LLK425ZVFP8D/personal-info-example.png" alt="personal_info_example.png" height="256" width="828" loading="lazy" data-display-size="medium" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h3 data-id="personal-info-on-a-user-profile">Personal info on a user profile</h3><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/12RDMK74LG58/profile-personal-29info-example.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/12RDMK74LG58/profile-personal-29info-example.png" alt="profile_personal)info_example.png" height="450" width="412" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h2 data-id="permissions-overview">Permissions overview</h2><p>In this section, we'll take a high-level look at the available permissions you can assign to a Role. When updating permissions, be sure to click <strong>Save </strong>at the bottom of the page to apply them.</p><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: Permissions are grouped into various categories (e.g., Garden, Reputation, etc.). Certain permissions are associated with optional addons and integrations. If some of these permissions are not available to you, verify the associated addon or integration is enabled, or contact your CSM or Support. </p><h3 data-id="garden">Garden</h3><p>The <strong>Garden </strong>section governs some of the most important permissions in Vanilla, and should be carefully reviewed for all Roles.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/DOMFNTBC9HUK/edit-role-permissions-garden.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/DOMFNTBC9HUK/edit-role-permissions-garden.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-garden.png" height="734" width="843" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="activity">Activity</h4><ul><li><strong>View </strong>- Users can view the activity on the Activity Page.</li><li><strong>Delete</strong> - Users can delete any activity (regardless of author) on the Activity Page. </li></ul><h4 data-id="advanced-notifications">Advanced Notifications</h4><ul><li><strong>Allow</strong> - This permission is now deprecated since the introduction of our category following feature. </li></ul><h4 data-id="community">Community</h4><ul><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Gives users who have the “View Settings” (but not “Manage Settings”) permission access to: <strong>Banner </strong>settings, <strong>Category </strong>settings, and <strong>Reaction </strong>settings. </li></ul><h4 data-id="curation">Curation</h4><p>Enabling the "Manage Curation" permission provides the following benefits:</p><ul><li>Gives access to the <strong>Promote </strong>Reaction. The Promote reaction gives five points to the promoted content and displays it on the Best of Page. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions#curating-with-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives additional weighting to SPAM or Abuse reactions. When reacting with the SPAM and Abuse reactions, this will set the user’s reaction to have a weight of five points rather than the default one point per reaction. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions#curating-with-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives users the ability to mark answers as rejected/accepted. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/20-questions-answers-q-a#qa-statuses" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives users the ability to change a discussion to a question when the Q&A addon is enabled.</li></ul><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: This is typically a default permission for the Moderator Role.</p><h4 data-id="email">Email</h4><ul><li><strong>View</strong> - Users can receive notifications via email. This <em>does not</em> reveal the email addresses of other users in the role. Typically, this should only be disabled for Roles that should not receive email notifications of any kind (including password reset emails, etc.).</li></ul><h4 data-id="moderation">Moderation</h4><p>Enabling the "Manage Moderation" permission provides the following benefits:</p><ul><li>Gives access to the Moderation queue. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/342-moderation#moderation-queue" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives access to the SPAM queue. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/29-spam-prevention-and-detection#spam-queue" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives access to the Change Log. </li><li>Gives permission to change the status of an idea when Ideation is enabled. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/92-ideation#idea-statuses" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives permission to approve Role Applications. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/323-role-applications" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more</a>)</li><li>Gives permission to Move and Merge posts. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/109-moving-discussions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: This is typically a default permission for the Moderator Role, and is what identifies a user as a Moderator.</p><h4 data-id="no-ads">No Ads</h4><ul><li><strong>Allow </strong>- Hides Pockets labeled as ads. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/19-pockets" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="personal-info">Personal Info</h4><ul><li><strong>View</strong> - Users can view <em>personal info</em> on a user's profile, such as Email, Register IP, and Last IP on the profile page. <em>For security reasons, we strongly recommend </em><strong><em>only </em></strong><em>giving this Permission to admins and trusted moderators. </em></li></ul><h4 data-id="profile-picture">Profile Picture</h4><ul><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Users can edit their own profile picture.</li></ul><h4 data-id="profiles"> Profiles</h4><ul><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Users can edit their own profile. Does <strong>not</strong> grant the ability to edit <em>other </em>user's profiles.</li><li><strong>View</strong> - Users can view the profiles of other users.</li></ul><h4 data-id="settings">Settings</h4><ul><li><strong>View </strong>- Users can view account settings in the Dashboard. This permission, along with the "Manage Community" and "Manage Moderation" permissions, are required to have access to the Dashboard. <strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: This is typically a default permission for the Moderator Role.</li><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Grants full access to all functionality in the Dashboard. <strong>This is an Admin only permission. </strong>This permission is typically what identifies a user as an administrator.</li></ul><h4 data-id="sign-in">Sign In</h4><ul><li><strong>Allow</strong> - Enables users to log in to your Vanilla community. Generally speaking, this should be enabled but it can be used to temporarily prevent a group of users from logging in. </li></ul><h4 data-id="staff">Staff</h4><ul><li><strong>Allow</strong> - For certain integrations, like Zendesk and Salesforce, this allows staff to access the plugin functionality without gaining Vanilla community moderation tools.</li></ul><h4 data-id="tokens">Tokens</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - For use with <strong>API v2</strong>. Allows users to generate personal API tokens via their profile. The tokens’ permissions will be reflective of the permissions of the user who generated the token. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/41-authentication-with-personal-access-tokens" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="uploads">Uploads</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can upload attachments when using the Rich editor. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/57-uploading-files" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="users">Users</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Allows moderators and admins to manually create users on the User page in the Moderation section of the Dashboard (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/129-creating-user-accounts" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">read more</a>), as well as to create users via the API using their API token. </li><li><strong>Approve</strong> - Allows moderators and admins to approve users’ requests for membership, if using the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/303-registration-methods#approval" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Approval registration method</a>.</li><li><strong>Delete</strong> - Allows moderators and admins to delete members from the User page in the Moderation section of the Dashboard, and delete users via the API using their API token. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/143-deleting-users-deletion-methods-and-data-access-requests" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Allows moderators and admins to edit user info in the Dashboard, on frontend user profiles, and via the API using their API token. </li></ul><h3 data-id="vanilla">Vanilla</h3><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/ISOPQKVW53RS/edit-role-permissions-vanilla.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/ISOPQKVW53RS/edit-role-permissions-vanilla.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-vanilla.png" height="235" width="1003" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="approval">Approval</h4><ul><li><strong>Require</strong> - If this permission is set, unverified members’ posts will have to be approved from the moderation queue before they are posted on the community (also known as pre-moderation). (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/304-pre-moderating-content" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="comments">Comments</h4><ul><li><strong>Me</strong> - This permission has been deprecated and no longer functions. </li></ul><h4 data-id="discussions">Discussions </h4><ul><li><strong>Closeown</strong> - Users can close their own discussions. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/108-closing-discussions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="tagging">Tagging</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - If the <strong>Tagging </strong>addon is enabled, this permission allows users to <em>create Tags</em>. Note that if tagging is enabled, <em>all users </em>can add <em>existing </em>tags to discussions; this permission is to allow <em>new</em> tags to be created.</li></ul><h3 data-id="conversations">Conversations</h3><p>Conversations are private messages sent between users. This feature lets users continue conversations outside of discussions, interact with moderators and administrators, and privately share information between each other. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/301-conversations-private-messaging" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/J3OM6X1S4BH5/edit-role-permissions-conversations.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/J3OM6X1S4BH5/edit-role-permissions-conversations.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-conversations.png" height="146" width="1003" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="add-conversations">Add Conversations</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Allows for new private conversations to be initiated. Removing this from users will still allow them to <em>receive </em>messages from those with the permission, they simply will not be able to <em>initiate </em>conversations. Note that admins and moderators need this permission in order to use the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/30-warnings-notes-add-on" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Warnings & Notes</a> addon.</li></ul><h4 data-id="moderation-1">Moderation</h4><ul><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Enables admins and moderators to view and manage private messages between users. Note that this permission is <strong>not </strong>recommended. If an appropriate use-case arises, a config setting change must be requested through your CSM or Support.</li></ul><h3 data-id="reputation">Reputation</h3><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: These permissions are only available if the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/15-badges" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Badges</a> addon is enabled.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/PGQBXYF49R5X/edit-role-permissions-reputation.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/PGQBXYF49R5X/edit-role-permissions-reputation.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-reputation.png" height="92" width="1001" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="badges">Badges</h4><ul><li><strong>Give</strong> - Enables admins to manually award badges from a users profile or from the badges page, as well as to approve badge requests. This also governs the ability to give badges via the API using their API token. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/15-badges#giving-a-badge" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more) </a></li><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Enables the ability to create and manage badges in the Dashboard. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/15-badges#editing-a-badge" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more) </a></li><li><strong>Request</strong> - Users can request a badge from the badge request page. This action sends the request to the badge request queue.<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/15-badges#requesting-a-badge" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc"> (Read more) </a></li><li><strong>View</strong> - Ability to see badges on profiles. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/15-badges" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more) </a></li></ul><h3 data-id="groups">Groups</h3><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: These permissions are only available if the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/70-groups-and-events" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Groups and Events</a> addon is enabled.</p><h4 data-id="email-invitations">Email Invitations</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - By default, group owners, leaders, and managers can invite users to join Groups by searching and selecting registered usernames. This permission these users to also be able to invite users to join groups via email addresses. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/324-release-2020-017#group-invitations-by-email" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="group">Group</h4><ul><li><strong>Add </strong>- Grants the ability to create new groups. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/70-groups-and-events" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="moderation-2">Moderation</h4><ul><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Grants the ability to moderate groups, even if not a group member. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/70-groups-and-events" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h3 data-id="plugins">Plugins</h3><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/YHDJ6E7AXLCS/edit-role-permissions-plugins.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/YHDJ6E7AXLCS/edit-role-permissions-plugins.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-plugins.png" height="132" width="1001" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="attachments-upload">Attachments Upload</h4><ul><li><strong>Allow</strong> - Users can upload files when using a legacy editor (i.e., any editor other than the Rich editor).</li></ul><h4 data-id="pockets">Pockets</h4><ul><li><strong>Manage</strong> - Grants access to the Pockets addon, if enabled. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/19-pockets" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="polls">Polls</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Permission to create a poll-type discussion when the Polls plugin is enabled. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/93-polls" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="signatures">Signatures</h4><ul><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Users can create and edit a signature when the Signatures plugin is enabled. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/141-signatures" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h3 data-id="reactions">Reactions</h3><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: These permissions are only available if the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Reactions</a> addon is enabled.</p><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/0K6DFJ4N03QG/edit-role-permissions-reactions.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/0K6DFJ4N03QG/edit-role-permissions-reactions.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-reactions.png" height="173" width="1000" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="flag">Flag </h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can apply the “Spam” and “Abuse” Reactions. If enough of these occur, the post will be hidden for review <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions#curating-with-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(read more</a>). In addition, it allows users to report posts. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/28-reporting-posts" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li></ul><h4 data-id="negative">Negative </h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can apply the “Dislike,” “Downvote,” “Off Topic,” and “WTF” Reactions. Negative Reactions are inactive by default. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="positive">Positive </h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can apply positive Reactions. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/22-reactions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h3 data-id="email-1">Email</h3><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: These permissions are only available if the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/24-vanilla-pop-forum-email-interaction" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">VanillaPop</a> addon is enabled.</p><h4 data-id="comments-1">Comments </h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - When using VanillaPop, grants ability to comment by email.</li></ul><h4 data-id="conversations-1">Conversations</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - When using VanillaPop, grants ability to add private messages by email.</li></ul><h4 data-id="discussions-1">Discussions</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - When using VanillaPop, grants ability to add discussions by email. </li></ul><h3 data-id="knowledge">Knowledge</h3><p><strong>📝 NOTE</strong>: These permissions are only available if the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/81-vanilla-knowledge-user-guide" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Knowledge</a> addon is enabled.</p><h4 data-id="articles">Articles</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can add articles to your knowledge base. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/81-vanilla-knowledge-user-guide#adding-knowledge-base-articles" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="kb">KB</h4><ul><li><strong>View</strong> - Users can view your knowledge base. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/categories/16-knowledge-base" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h3 data-id="default-category-permissions">Default Category Permissions</h3><p>These permissions apply to any categories that <strong>do not</strong> have "custom permissions" enabled. To enable custom permissions for a category, edit the category in question and toggle the <strong>This category has custom permissions </strong>option. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/8-category-configuration-management#custom-permissions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></p><p>Check out the article below to learn more: </p><div class="js-embed embedResponsive" data-embedjson="{"body":"Category Management Categories are how Vanilla organizes discussions within a community. Categories can be added, edited, deleted, sorted, and tiered via the Dashboard. Every discussion is placed in one (and only one) category. You can find Categories under the Settings tab Dashboard, listed under “Discussions”. You can…","photoUrl":"https:\/\/us.v-cdn.net\/6030677\/uploads\/VWGAXAF5OFCO\/microsoftteams-image.png","url":"https:\/\/success.vanillaforums.com\/kb\/articles\/8-category-configuration-management","embedType":"link","name":"Category Configuration & Management - Vanilla Success"}"> <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/8-category-configuration-management" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc"> https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/8-category-configuration-management </a> </div><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/7XMJTMB61YZF/edit-role-permissions-defaultcategory.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/7XMJTMB61YZF/edit-role-permissions-defaultcategory.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-DefaultCategory.png" height="175" width="1150" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h4 data-id="comments-2">Comments</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can add comments in a category. This permission is also required for users to vote on polls.</li><li><strong>Delete</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to delete comments in a category. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/110-deleting-discussions-and-comments" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to edit comments in a category. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/106-editing-posts" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li></ul><h4 data-id="discussions-2">Discussions</h4><ul><li><strong>Add</strong> - Users can add discussions in a category.</li><li><strong>Announce</strong> - Users can announce a discussion (sometimes called "pinning") in the category. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/101-announcements" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li><li><strong>Close</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to close a discussion in the category, preventing new comments from being added. Note that admins and moderators will still be able to comment. If you would like users to be able to close their <em>own</em> discussions, use the <strong>Vanilla > Closeown discussions</strong> permission instead. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/108-closing-discussions" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li><li><strong>Delete</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to delete discussions in a category. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/110-deleting-discussions-and-comments" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li><li><strong>Edit</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to edit discussions in a category. <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/106-editing-posts" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">(Read more)</a></li><li><strong>Sink</strong> - Allows admins and moderators to sink discussions in a category. When you sink a discussion, it won't be brought to the top of the discussion list when new comments are added. This feature is typically used to de-emphasize a discussion and keep it off the recent discussion lists in a more subtle way than simply closing it. (<a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/107-sink" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Read more</a>)</li><li><strong>View</strong> - Users can view discussions and their associated comments in the category.</li></ul><h2 data-id="special-considerations-for-infrastructure-categories">Special Considerations for Infrastructure Categories</h2><div class="embedExternal embedImage display-large float-none"> <div class="embedExternal-content"> <a class="embedImage-link" href="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/3BVNTSAMIQWK/edit-role-permissions-reportedposts-socialgroups.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener ugc" target="_blank"> <img class="embedImage-img" src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6030677/uploads/3BVNTSAMIQWK/edit-role-permissions-reportedposts-socialgroups.png" alt="edit_role_permissions-ReportedPosts_SocialGroups.png" height="351" width="1150" loading="lazy" data-display-size="large" data-float="none"></img></a> </div> </div> <h3 data-id="reported-posts">Reported Posts</h3><ul><li>Member-type users should typically be allowed to create reports, but <strong>not</strong> see them. </li><li>In order to report a discussion, members need the "add comment" permission in the Reported Posts category but should have no other permissions in this category.</li></ul><h3 data-id="social-groups">Social Groups</h3><ul><li>The Social Groups category is an infrastructure-only category associated with the <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/70-groups-and-events" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc">Groups addon</a>; it is not meant to be viewed by end users.</li><li>All users should only have the permission to add discussions and comments, not view.</li><li>If users have the permission to view this category, they will see posts from all groups, including private and secret or if they belong to them. </li><li>Allowing users to view this category will create unexpected behavior and is strongly discouraged.</li></ul><h2 data-id="theming-and-visual-considerations">Theming and visual considerations </h2><ul><li>The Role of a user is typically only visible in posts if the <strong>Role Titles</strong> addon is enabled; otherwise, it's shown on user profiles.</li><li>The description is only visible to admins and moderators.</li><li>If you would like to hide a Role from user profiles (or from the Role Titles addon), check the <strong>This Role is Personal Info</strong> box. This way, only users with permission to view personal info will see it.</li></ul><h2 data-id="additional-resources">Additional resources</h2><p>Click the link below to access a video expanding on what you learned in this article.</p><div class="js-embed embedResponsive" data-embedjson="{"body":"For more information, please see:","photoUrl":"https:\/\/us.v-cdn.net\/6030677\/uploads\/GXW21TRYG1JP\/share-imagevanilla-community.jpg","url":"https:\/\/success.vanillaforums.com\/kb\/articles\/449","embedType":"link","name":"G. Roles and Permissions [video] - HL Vanilla Community"}"> <a href="https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/449" rel="nofollow noreferrer ugc"> https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/449 </a> </div><p><br></p> </article> </main>