Roles are collections of permissions that get assigned to users. This article covers the Roles and Permissions pages under Administration — for a plain-language introduction to what roles and permissions mean day-to-day, see "Understanding Roles and Permissions" in Getting Started.
Creating a role
- In the sidebar, click Roles under Administration.
- Click New Role.
- Enter a Role name.
- Optionally set an Idle timeout in minutes for this role specifically — leave it blank to use the site-wide default (see "Configuring Site Settings"), or enter 0 so users in this role are never automatically signed out.
- Tick every individual Permission this role should grant.
- Click Save Role.
Important: a user needs at least one permission — from any role — before they can open the admin panel at all. A brand-new role with no permissions ticked will lock out anyone assigned only to it. Tick at least the "view" permissions for whatever content that role should manage.
Managing individual permissions
The Permissions page lists every individual permission that exists in the system (view/create/update/delete for each content type, plus the standalone ones like Manage Users). Permissions themselves are fixed to match what the application actually supports — you assign existing permissions to roles, rather than inventing new ones.
Deleting a role
A role can only be deleted once no user is currently assigned to it — this prevents accidentally leaving someone with no role at all. If the trash icon is missing or disabled for a role, reassign its users to a different role first, then delete it.