Form and Sheet Functionality - Available security levels for users

Hi,

We've created a web form in Smartsheet that users populate and then directly feeds a "master" sheet. From there, we are creating multiple reports off of this sheet for our various departments.

Our issue is how to restrict user access to the sheet as we don't want data to accidently be deleted by one of the many users.

Is there a way to set up security to restrict access to the sheet but still allow the users to populate the form?

Any insight would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Rick

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Comments

J. Craig Williams

Rick,

Not yet.

However, Smartsheet integrates with Google Forms

https://www.google.com/forms/about/

and I hear good things about the solution.

I'm still learning about them myself.

Craig

Tim Meeks

Rick,

Google Forms may be your best route...but here are a couple of other ideas.

Based on your comments above, users don't have to have access to the sheet to get to the webform. They can access the webform by a link you provide them.

Also, you could create a report for the users and have them see the data there instead of within the sheet.

Lastly, if possible, you can make them Editors or Viewers and lock the columns so they can't delete the data.

Hope that helps.

Tim

JamesR

Adding to the comments by Craig and Tim,

One of the great things about Smartsheet Web forms is that whoever has a link can complete a form and they do not need access to Smartsheet at all.

Viewing via Reports is good but remember that they are live data and as such the data is editable, hence the need to lock down columns that you do not want them to change. Also Reports can be published as Read only and again this produces a URL link that allows anybody that has the link to see the data but not change it.

JamesR

C5Longhorn

All,

I appreciate the feedback from you all. It has been very helpful. We're entering customers using a webform and then taking the data from the sheet to build reports for different groups. I don't however, want users to accidently delete data from the sheet.

I'm going to follow up on all of your solutions.

J. Craig Williams

Tim and James,

I thought once you had logged into Smartsheet, you could have access to the system. Even though the link opens the form, users still have access to the data now if they wanted to get to it (maliciously or accidentally making unwanted changes).

Did I miss something?

Thanks,

Craig

JamesR

Craig,

If you are a smartsheet licence holder you can get ito smartsheet, but not necessaraly into the sheet that the form is populating.

If you are an non licenced holder you can only get into smartsheet if you have been shared to either a sheet or a workspace.

Even if you are a Licence holder but have not been shared to the sheet that the form is created for, you cannot get into the sheet.

When you create forms now you have the option to allow anybody with the url link to access the form or only licenced smartsheet holders. That is still anybody who has a licence from any organisation.

If they are shared then yes they can access the sheet at the rights assigned at the time of sharing:

Viewers only see

Editors only edit

Admins can restructure

I hope that clarifys it for you.

James

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J. Craig Williams

James,

I missed that nuance, thanks for the clarification. I had thought the person had to be shared to the sheet too . So glad that is not true!

The doc is likely old as it requires a login, if I recall correctly.

For some reason, I equated login with sharing, even though I should know better and the answer was sitting there waiting for the lightbulb.

Thanks.

Craig

C5Longhorn

So, I got some more information from my users. I appreciate all the dialogue and tips. We are loading a customer master sheet and I have to have users from different departments help populate and complete the sheet.

However, I only want them to have write/edit access to certain fields that are pertinent to their department

Is there a way to assign permissions or create a workaround so that users can populate some fields but not accidently delete an entire row in a sheet?

Thanks again for all the replies.

Rick

Tim Meeks

Rick,

There's always threatening to break their fingers or dock their pay.. But other than that... I'm afraid there are some limitations as even Editors can delete Rows.

Here's info on Locking from SS Help:

http://help.smartsheet.com/customer/portal/articles/522077

Locking a Column or Row

There are three rules for the lock feature:

Only the sheet owner or admins can lock or unlock columns/rows on a sheet

The sheet owner and admins can still edit and delete locked columns/rows

Editors can see locked columns/rows, but they can't edit the data in them. The same is true for anyone working from an Update Request or Published sheet.

NOTE: Locking a column doesn't prevent Editors from deleting or moving rows. It prevents them from editing any data in that column.

The lock feature is available from the column (right-click a column header) or row (right-click a row number) menus. The attachment and discussion columns cannot be locked. A lock icon will be displayed in the column or row headers to indicate that a column or row has been locked.