Knowledge Statuses
Is the article viewable? You can define statuses that can be associated with knowledge entries, such as Draft or Reviewed. A status is set for a knowledge entry when it is created.
Knowledge Status controls the availability of the article whereas Knowledge Profiles control the access to articles.
Understanding Knowledge Statuses and Moderation is essential to managing your document visibility and control.
Knowledge Statuses
These define the current state of a document, dictating whether it's accessible or not. Typical statuses include:
Draft: The document is in preparation and not visible publicly.
Published: The document is approved, published, and viewable by the intended audience.
Retired: The document is outdated or no longer relevant.
Pending Review: The document awaits approval or revisions before publication.
Moderation Process
Moderation ensures that only content meeting your standards gets published. It involves:
Moderation Enabled: Articles must be flagged as "Moderated" to undergo the process. Unmoderated articles remain unpublished.
Visibility: For moderated articles to appear on the Self Service Portal, they must:
Be assigned a publicly available status.
Be linked to a Knowledge Profile accessible by the user's Self Service Portal Security Role.
Pass the moderation checkpoint.
In essence, Knowledge Statuses serve as a visibility switch, while moderation adds a layer of content quality control, ensuring only the right eyes see the right documents.
Knowledge Statuses - Is the Article Viewable?
For example, you may have 3 statuses: Draft, Published, Retired, and Pending Review.
Here you will also see additional columns, the most important being Moderated and Published to the Self Service Portal.
If you have moderation enabled in Knowledge Bank Settings,
You must tick the Moderated checkbox else the articles with said status will not be available to anyone.
In order for an article to be visible on the Self Service Portal, it must be assigned a status that has been flagged as available to the Self Service Portal AND
be assigned a profile that has been granted to the users Self Service Portal Security Role
if moderation is enabled, must also be assigned a status that has the Moderated checkbox ticked
This is important to understand:
An article can have a Knowledge Profile granted to users of the Self Service Portal, for example, but if its corresponding Status is not available to the portal, it will not appear on the portal.
Likewise, an article with a knowledge profile not granted to users of the portal with a status that is available to the portal will not appear on the portal but will still appear in Core and Nano.
Example
An organization has the following configured:
Moderation: Enabled
Knowledge Profiles: Public, Internal, Retired
Self Service Portal Content Access: Only Public is granted
Knowledge Statuses:
Published (Moderated = Yes, Published to the Portal = Yes)
Pending Review (Moderated = Yes, Published to the Portal = No)
Draft (Moderated = No, Published to the Portal = No)
Retired (Moderated = No, Published to the Portal = No)
Self Service Portal Security Role Content Access Knowledge Profiles: Public
Agent Knowledge Management Security Role Content Access Knowledge Profiled: Public, Pending Review, Retired
KB Article A has a Profile of Public and a Status of Published - Can users in the SSP see it?
YES - It is visible on the portal, in Core, and in Nano.
Why?
Because moderated is turned on, or checked.
Because the Self Service Portal Role has been given access to the content.
Because the Agent Knowledge Management Security Role has been given access to the content
Because the Status has been set to "Visible on the Self Service Portal".
KB Article B has a profile of Public and a status of Draft - Can Users on the SSP see it?
NO - It is not visible on the portal FURTHER, it is not visible in Nano or in Core even if Analysts have been granted access to view articles in Draft.
Why?
Because moderated is not turned on, or checked. (no one can see it)
Because the Self Service Portal Role has not been given access to the content.
Because the Status has not been set to "Visible on the Self Service Portal".
KB Article C has a profile of Public and a status of Pending Review - Can Users on the SSP see it?
NO - It is not visible to the portal but is visible in Core and Nano.
Why?
Because moderated is turned on, or checked.
Because the Agent Knowledge Management Security Role has been given access to the content
Because the Status has not been set to "Visible on the Self Service Portal".
Defining a Knowledge Status
Select System Administration.
In the Explorer pane, expand Knowledge Bank.
Select the Knowledge Statuses option. The existing statuses are displayed, along with the settings associated with them, although some of the options depend on settings set elsewhere, as described below. (You may like to adjust the column widths to see all of the columns.)
In the Status column, type the name for the new status.
Select the settings which you would like to apply to the status:
Moderated | Enables knowledge entries with this status to be found via a knowledge search. Moderation Enabled must be selected in the Knowledge Bank Settings to display this option. |
Publish to Self Service Portal | Enables knowledge entries with this status to be visible on the Self Service Portal. If Moderation Enabled is selected in the Knowledge Bank Settings window, knowledge entries will only display on the Self Service Portal if the status assigned to the entry has both the Moderated and Publish to Self Service Portal options selected. |
Email Contributors | Enables an email to be sent to the author and contributors when a knowledge entry is changed to this status. This column is only displayed if the Email Notifications For Configured Status Changes option is selected in the Knowledge Bank Settings. |
Email Editors | Enables an email to be sent to all Analysts with the Edit option enabled in their Knowledge Management Security Role when the entry is changed to this status. This column is only displayed if the Email Notifications For Configured Status Changes option is selected in the Knowledge Bank Settings. |
Default | Makes this the default status. When an analyst creates a knowledge entry and does not specify a status, this status will be applied. You can select only one status to be the default. |
7. Repeat for each status you want to create.
Updating a Knowledge Status
You can update the details associated with a knowledge status. This will update wherever the status is currently used, as well as for new knowledge entries.
Select System Administration.
In the Explorer pane, expand Knowledge Bank.
Select the Knowledge Statuses option. The existing statuses are displayed, along with the settings associated with them.
Select the Knowledge Status you want to update.
Update the details, overwriting where necessary. (You may like to adjust the column widths to see all of the columns.)
Deleting a Knowledge Status
Warning
You cannot reverse this procedure. If you deleted a Knowledge Status by mistake, you cannot restore it and have to re-create the entry by creating a new Knowledge Status.
However, this may cause the appearance of duplicated data in reports if knowledge entries in your system are linked to both the deleted value and active value.
Knowledge entries linked to deleted Knowledge Status remain linked to that deleted value until an active value is selected in the Knowledge Entry's Detail window. You cannot do this in bulk.
If you delete a Knowledge Status that is being used on 2, 200, or 2000 Knowledge articles, you will have to update each one manually from the deleted Knowledge Status.
Existing articles will continue to show the status, but it will not be available when selecting a status.
You cannot delete the default status. This is supplied as Unspecified but may have been renamed.
Select System Administration.
In the Explorer pane, expand Knowledge Bank.
Select the Knowledge Statuses option. The existing statuses are displayed, along with the settings associated with them.
Select the Knowledge Status you want to delete.
If you have chosen the system defined status, you will receive an error message stating that you are attempting to delete a "static record", which cannot be deleted. Select OK to close the warning window.
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