Drafting and Approval process

A draft is an unpublished version of a Knowledge Base article or document. Both new and edited articles and documents can be saved as drafts. The following rules apply:

• Each article or document may only have one draft at a time.
• Drafts can be created by any user with the object permissions to add or edit articles and documents.
• Drafts are shared across users. If the first user saves a draft for an article, and the a second user edits that article, the second user will see the draft created by the first user. A message bar will appear:
  
• Only users with permission to approve a draft can publish articles and documents.
• Changes to related items and accessory tabs cannot be saved as a draft. They are published immediately.
• If you click Save as Draft but did not make any changes to the article or document, no draft is created.

Your Autotask administrator can optionally implement a drafting and approval process for Knowledge Base articles and documents.

• Assign a security level where the Approve object permission is set to No to all users whose articles and documents you want to review before they get published.
• Assign a security level where the Approve object permission is set to Yes to all users who can publish articles and documents without a review process, or who can approve the drafts or other users

Refer to Knowledge Base and Documents security settings.

When you create or edit an article or document, you will see the following buttons on the button bar. Note that not all buttons will appear in all contexts.

Non-approver:

Approver:

Button	Approver	Non-approver	Description
Save as Draft			Any content you enter for a new, or changes you make to an existing, article or document will be available to all users who have Add or Edit permissions. Use this option if the article or document is not yet complete, or requires input from another user. A new item is saved with an approval status of New Draft. An already published item is saved with an approval status of Draft in Progress. Changes saved as a draft do not appear in the Article History or Document History.
Submit for Approval			When you have completed a new item or finished updating an existing one, select Submit for Approval. The approval status of the item is updated to Draft Pending Approval. If a user selects Edit Article or Edit Document for an item where approval is pending, a message informs them that editing this draft will withdraw the submission.
Discard Draft			If you have created or edited a draft, but later determine that the draft is not needed, you have the option to discard the draft. If you were editing a published item, this will delete the draft and set the status back to the Published. If you discard the draft of a new item, it is deleted.
Approve & Publish			Users with approval permissions set to Yes can approve and publish their own or other users' content items at any time. When this button is clicked, the following happens: The draft version becomes the most recent published version, and the approval status of the item is updated to Published. A new version is tracked on the Article Version History or the Document Version History page. The History pages will show the edits that were made. An internal note is added to the Activity tab that a draft has been published.
Reject			Users with approval permissions set to Yes can reject other users' drafts. When you reject a draft, a dialog box will open. You will have two options: If you select Reject and Save as Draft, the approval status is set back to Draft in Progress or New Draft, allowing the author to make additional modifications. If you select Reject and Discard Draft, the draft is deleted. If the item was previously published, the status is set back to Published, and the last published version is restored. If you discard the draft of a new item, it is deleted.
Cancel			Click Cancel to exit Edit mode without making changes.

To locate and manage articles and documents by approval status, the Approval Status filter was added to the Knowledge Base Search page and the Documentation Manager.

• On the Knowledge Base Search page, you may have to add the Approval Status filter.
  
• On the Documentation Manager page, the Approval Status filter appears on the filter row.

This makes it easy for users to find their own drafts, and for approvers to find items that require approval. To locate an item, select one of the following approval statuses:

Approval Status	Description
New Draft	A new article or document (never published or submitted for approval) that has been saved as a draft
Draft In Progress	A new draft for a previously published article or document that has not been submitted for approval
Draft Pending Approval	A draft that has been submitted for approval and publishing
Published	An article or document that is published, and for which no draft exists

You can also locate articles and documents by approval status on the following pages:

• > Admin > Automation > Knowledge Base & Documentation > Knowledge Base
• > Admin > Automation > Knowledge Base & Documentation >Documentation