17 Jun 2019

Manage system groups in Collaborate

Product Filter HighQ Collaborate
Product Area Filter System groups, Permissions

Accessing system groups

System groups can be only be created and managed by System Administrators, via the System Admin console. 

Firstly, navigate to the System Admin console and select Group admin on the left:

The System group list page will be displayed:

Only a single system group is included by default (in addition to the HighQ system group), which is the automatically generated system group that includes all users from the internal organisation.

Types of system groups

There are three types of System Groups, each of which is indicated with a different icon and indicator.

Manually created and maintained. System administrators will have the right to create and manage this type of system group. Manually created system groups can have any type of user as a member, including internal users and external users. These system groups are indicated with a green gear icon and the suffix '[system group]':


Synchronized groups. These mimic active directory groups and are only available if active directory integration has been implemented by installing the HighQ Appliance. These groups can be automatically imported from a firm’s active directory / LDAP system. These groups cannot be managed via the system admin console, but they can be viewed.  These groups are indicated with a yellow curved arrows icon and the suffix '[synced group]':  


Automatically generated groups that correspond to a single organisation. Every member of an organisation will automatically be added to a system group for that organisation. These groups are indicated with a red icon and the suffix '[org group]':

Although system group names must be unique, different types of groups can share the same name. For example, there can be an active directory group called Partners and a manually generated group with the same name. In every site where a system group is used, the group will be noted with the system group identifier in brackets following the group's name, to help to distinguish among like named groups.

To create a new manual system group, click Add group:

Manually creating system groups


Which displays the Create system group page:

To create the group, enter the unique system group name, optionally add members, and click Save.

To add members to the system group, start typing within the Add members field:

Archived users will not appear in this list.

Alternatively, click on the magnifying glass icon to browse all system users:
 

And select one or more users using the checkboxes to the left.

The selected members will be listed at the bottom of the page, along with the members' email addresses and organisations. Once all of the members have been added, click Save:

The new system group will now be displayed within the System group list screen, showing the group name, group creator, the number of members and an actions menu:

Modifying a system group

A manually created system group can be modified by clicking Edit option from the actions menu:

The Edit system group screen will be displayed. Within this screen, the system group name can be changed, new members can be added and existing members removed:


You can remove an existing group member by clicking x within the Actions column. To save any changes you have made, click Save.

Archiving a manual system group

A manually generated system group can be archived, but organisation and active directory system groups cannot be archived from within Collaborate. Click the Action button and select Archive

If the system group has been added to any sites, then it will not be possible to archive that group. Instead, an error message will be displayed indicating that the group must be removed from all sites before being archived.

Viewing the members of any type of system group
An archived system group will be completely inaccessible in the future.  However, archiving a system group has no impact on the status of the individual members of that group and archiving a group will not archive the members of that group.

Because organisation and active directory based system groups are automatically generated, those system groups cannot be manually updated nor archived. (Active directory groups can be removed from Collaborate by using the active directory connection that is part of the HighQ Appliance.) However it is possible to view the membership for any type of system group, by clicking a group's name:
The members in each group are listed alphabetically. It is also possible to edit a manual system group by clicking Edit.

Viewing sites associated with a system group

A system group can be associated with one or more sites and the members of that group will then become users of these sites. Within the Actions column, click More actions > Site list:


The <group name> [System group] screen will be displayed. If there are no sites associated with the group, the following screen will be displayed:


Displaying the sites that the group is associated with.

Searching for a system group

The search box at the top of the System group list screen can be used to find a system group by group name. Start typing and any matching system groups will be listed:

Managing a user's system groups 

To determine all of the system groups that a user is a member of, navigate to the Users admin page within System Admin:

Search for the user, and click Manage groups:

This will display a page listing every system group the user is a member of:

This page:

  • Lists in the righthand box, every system group, regardless of type of group, that the user is currently a member of
  • Enables you to remove the user from any manually generated system group they are a member of by selecting one or more groups in the righthand box and clicking on the right to left arrow
  • Shows, in the lefthand box, every manually generated system group that the user is not a member of. By selecting one or more groups in the lefthand box and clicking on the left to right arrow, the user can be added to those groups

This page useful and helps manage an individual user's membership in system groups and helps determine what groups they are member of. 

Due to the fact that a user cannot be removed from activity directory and organisation based system groups, these groups are shown in grey text in the righthand box, and these groups cannot be disassociated from.

Finally, when a user is archived from the system, they will be removed from any system groups they were members of.

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