[ckan-dev] OWNER role: solution wants more problems

Mon Jan 31 19:12:11 UTC 2011

Hi all,

I'm trying to merge the IATI branch (well, repo) of CKAN and the
default line. One of the things that is special about that branch is
the OWNER role. In IATI, the workflow for creating a group is roughly
the following:

1. User signs on, creates a group
2. Group is in pending state, not shown to normal visitors, can only
be seen by admins *and* creator.
3. Admin receives E-Mail notification
4. Admin changes state from "pending" to "active"

In order to implement this, I had to create a special role for the
user creating a group: they may see the group (after creation & to
check on its status), although its state is not "active", but they are
not authorized to admin it (that would allow then to approve the group
on their own). Thus, the OWNER role was born: its a bit more than an
EDITOR and a bit less than ADMIN.

I would now like to propose moving OWNER into CKAN default, for two reasons:

1. Its really hard to implement as a plugin
2. It allows us to play with "pending" workflow in other places, e.g.
overheid.nl

What do you think?

 - Friedrich