admin/roles/permissions

This page relates to the Front Page Roles and Capabilities/Permissions in Moodle 2.0. It does not apply to any previous version of Moodle.

Front Page Roles, Permissions and Capabilities

In Moodle, Permissions and Capabilities are terms that are often used to describe the same thing, they are interchangeable. It does not matter which term you use in most circumstances, but this is one area where there can be no misunderstanding about what does what. Experiment on your private Moodle with Permissions where you can control things, a conflict in Permissions or a changed Permission that gives someone access to things they should not have access to, can cause a number of problems for Administrators and, in absolute dire circumstances, can wreck your Moodle.

A Quick Overview of Permissions/Capabilities and Roles

Permissions are all context driven.

In this sense, "context" means that the current location of the User. This is the point at which permissions are calculated, the User is granted Capabilities that suit the Role at that point and depending on which permissions are granted at that level, the User's Capabilities will be limited by those permissions.

For example:

 At the Front Page, not logged in: No permissions are granted except the ability to log in.
 At the Front Page after log in: Depending on the "Default Role" the User may be an Authenticated User, a Student, or some other Role.
 At the Category Level: The User will usually be an Authenticated User, but may be given the Role of Administrator, Course Manager or Teacher. 
 At the Course level: Most Users will be given a role of Student, some will be Teachers, fewer will be Course Managers, and very few will be Administrators.

NOTE: Permissions for Roles are ALWAYS calculated at the place where they are given a Role other than an Authenticated User. The Role is then granted to all levels below the place where the Role is granted. In practice this means if Joan Smith is granted the Role of Teacher at the Science Category level, then Joan will be a Teacher in ALL courses in the Science Category. If John Smith is given the Role of Teacher in Physics 101, then when he goes to the Science Category, he will be an Authenticated user, and he may not enter any other course as a Teacher, until given permissions, capabilities, to be a Teacher in another course. This also means that if the Default Role assigned at the Front Page is Student, then that person will be automatically enrolled in all courses in the site. To assign a Default Role, go to Front page settings ► Edit settings and Default Front Page Role at the bottom of the page. Select the Role, usually Authenticated User, but never Guest or Student unless you are prepared to allow all visitors access to all courses in your Moodle. There is another option now, and that is "Authenticated User in Front Page only". Experiment with this Role if you chose, it should give you plenty of scope to provide Capabilities to Users at the Front Page, without compromising the rest of your site.

Roles are assigned at all levels of Moodle, and the permissions granted only apply to that User in that context.

Assigning Roles in the Front Page

Be careful, very careful here. Assigning Roles from the Front Page can have widespread repercussions. If you assign a Role for any particular purpose then make sure that that Role cannot influence or impact upon any course or category below the Front Page. If you want to assign a Default Role, use the Front Page Settings > Default Front Page Role variable. If you create a new Role to assign to people or groups of people, to give them permissions to do things in the Front Page, you may want to think about basing the new Role on the Authenticated User Role, providing additional permissions and capabilities. There is also the possibility of using the "Authenticated User in the Front Page only" option.

Assigning Capabilities/Permissions in the Front Page

Permissions in Moodle 2.0 are pretty much the same as they are in earlier versions, but the layout is far more definite in Moodle 2.0. There are a number of different options here, and the structure of assigning Capabilities to a Role in the Front Page is very different.

Adding Capability to a Role

Once you have selected the Capability, click the Plus sign which takes you to the Permissions in Front Page page and you can select the Role to which the Capability is being added.

Click the Allow button

This applies to all Capabilities in the Front Page.

Setting a permission

More later.

See Also

Roles 2.0