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Using collaborative editing tools: versioning, link management, and locks

This article discusses the following features within the collaborative editing tools:

• Item versioning
• Library versioning
• Link management
• Working with locked items

Using versions

Lotus Web Content Manager ships a versioning systems with which authors, designers, and administrators can track the changes that have been made to specific items or to an entire library, identify versions of libraries by date or tag, and restore them in the future.

Item versioning

In Lotus Web Content Manager 6.1, several options, as listed in the following table, are available to define when an item should be versioned.

Global versioning strategy is defined in WCMConfigService.properties. These options are available:

 versioningStrategy.Default = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.AuthoringTemplate = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.Component = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.Content = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.PresentationTemplate = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.Site = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.Taxonomy = always | never | manual 
	versioningStrategy.Workflow = always | never | manual 

You can restore a version by viewing an item's version history and selecting a version to restore.

Item versioning features for River Bend web site

When the development phase finished, River Bend administrators decided to disable versioning for all items but content in order to maximize performance.

To achieve this goal, they edited WCMConfigService.properties and set these properties:

 versioningStrategy.Default = never 
	versioningStrategy.AuthoringTemplate = never 
	versioningStrategy.Component = never 
	versioningStrategy.Content = manual 
	versioningStrategy.PresentationTemplate = never 
	versioningStrategy.Site = never 
	versioningStrategy.Taxonomy = never 
	versioningStrategy.Workflow = never 

To save a new version of all items every time they are published, WCM designers add a version action to the publish stage of their workflow. .

Library versioning

With library versioning, administrators can group the items within a library by label or date and time. River Bend administrators use this functionality to create a baseline of the first version of the Web site as shown in the following figure.

The library version is created in the background. You can follow the task status by using the library management portlet as shown in the following figure.

If something goes wrong, River Bend administrators can go back to a previous version, selected by date or label, and specify default options for nonexisting items as shown in the following figure.

Links management

The View References tool (selected in the following figure) helps River Bend authors to keep track of and manage all the links between items.

River Bend authors can be the references from other items to an item and vice versa as illustrated in the following figure.

Locks

As River Bend authors contribute content, they might find items that are locked by other users, because either they are being edited by another user or a draft item has been created.

Working with locked items

When a user is editing an item, the item is locked to other users. This means other users are unable to edit the item until the current user closes the item that they are editing. A lock symbol is displayed against items that are currently locked.

Administrators can lock and unlock items by selecting them and clicking either the Lock or Unlock button.