Note: You are currently viewing documentation for Moodle 2.9. Up-to-date documentation for the latest stable version of Moodle may be available here: Forum permissions.

Forum permissions

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Template:Forums Template:Moodle 1.7Roles and capabilities in Moodle 1.7 onwards allows the possibility of specific students being given permission to moderate a forum.


Common overrides

Overrides give temporary (contextual) permissions in a forum. Here are some common ones.

No discussions, but replies are allowed

An override may be used to set up a forum in which only teachers are to be allowed to start new discussions.

  1. Access the Assign roles page via the Roles tab in editing forum page, then follow the "Override roles" link. (In Moodle 1.9 onwards, click the "Override permissions" tab in the editing forum page.)
  2. Select the Student role.
  3. Set the capability mod/forum:startdiscussion to prevent.
  4. Click the "Save changes" button.

Note: By default, only administrators are able to override permissions. Instructions on enabling teachers to override permissions can be found in Override permissions.

No discussions, no replies

An override may be used to close/archive a forum so that students may no longer start new discussions, nor add replies, but may still read all the discussions.

  1. Access the Assign roles page via the Roles tab in editing forum page, then follow the "Override roles" link. (In Moodle 1.9 onwards, click the "Override permissions" tab in the editing forum page.)
  2. Select the Student role.
  3. Set the capabilities mod/forum:startdiscussion and mod/forum:replypost to prevent.
  4. Click the "Save changes" button.

Note: By default, only administrators are able to override permissions. Instructions on enabling teachers to override permissions can be found in Override permissions.

Enabling students to rate posts

By default, only admins and teachers can rate posts. An override may be used to enable students to rate posts.

  1. In Moodle 1.9 onwards, click the "Override permissions" tab in the editing forum page. For early versions of Moodle access the Assign roles page via the Roles tab in editing forum page, then follow the "Override roles" link.
  2. Select the Student role.
  3. Set the capability Rate Posts (mod/forum:rate) to allow.
  4. Click the "Save changes" button.

Overview of Forum overrides

By default, only administrators are able to override permissions. Instructions on enabling teachers to override permissions can be found in Override permissions. We have show a screen shot for reference below.

Tweaking the role of student in a forum


Forum capabilities

Here are the specific field names that impact forum permissions.

Guests and posting in a forum

There are certain things, such as posting in a forum, that guests are never allowed to do, despite the permissions interface suggesting otherwise.

The guest role has some special functionality, for example when a guest user attempts to post in a forum, they obtain the message "Sorry, guests are not allowed to post. Would you like to log in now with a full user account?"

If you wish guests to be able to post in a forum, you can create a similar role, say "visitor" with very few permissions allowed, then create an account and assign it the role of visitor. Guests can then share this visitor account.

See also

Using Moodle forum discussions:

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