I would like to reopen the discussion on this topic:
Even though Collections sortof work, it adds extra complexity, extra time and extra work. Being able to share a folder as opposed to having the all or nearly nothing approach be preferred. I am currently having to create 3 collections for every single folder within our PMO workspace, just so I can share what is in each folder with the appropriate permissions.
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Currently, Smartsheet allows sharing either at the workspace level or at the individual item (sheet/report/dashboard) level.
However, there is no way to share an entire folder with collaborators. This creates extra manual work when you want to give someone access to a set of related sheets or reports grouped in a folder, but don’t want to share the entire workspace.
Having the ability to share folders would:
This would be a very valuable enhancement for teams that manage multiple projects within the same workspace.
Having the same issue. Also Collections is hard to find! It seems the only way you can get to it is home → All workspaces → open a workspace. It is not mentioned anywhere on the Collections instructions. You cannot get to it from Browse. Took me forever to find it.
When using collections you can't add whole folders. So if I need to share docs within multiple folders either you share at the doc level to the collection and nothing is organized or you create multiple collections (one for each folder).
Sharing at the folder level is standard in most other platforms and would actually solve the issue!
I would agree that we need to have permissions at the folder level, it is causing a lot of extra time and effort to be sharing each individual sheet within the project folder.
Thank you for posting this @VBAGuru Collections is irrelevant. Folder level permissions would allow people to be admins of folders while allowing you to have users not be an admin for an entire workspace. This would help when creating a reporting/admin folder you don't want people to mess with without having to create a bunch of different workspaces when you should be able to just create a folder for them. By the way folder level permissions is something that exists in many other applications so it shouldn't be impossible.
Collections do not solve this issue and instead add more complexity to the organization process, especially for the average user. Folder level permissions can reduce the number of workspaces and give users more flexibility to control who sees important data.
It's a must-have feature.
I agree with this post. Additionally - When adding a report (even just as view only) to a collection, requires sharing to the source sheet still. Keeping sensitive data at risk and the need to instead continue with published links. The allowance to view (or even edit) only columns shown within a report that lives in a collection I've shared would be ideal. I find myself not using collections at all because why do step 3, when I can satisfy needs with just step 1 & 2?
Another voice to add that we REALLY need folder level permissions. The extra work and organizational maneuvering required because this is not an option is really frustrating.
Folder-level permissions are desperately needed. Collections do not solve the issue. The user experience with Collections is not straightforward to navigate. It isn't available through Browse and casual users are not familiar with the sidebar experience. As an admin, I don't want to create a new sheet or dashboard in a folder and then have to remember to add it to multiple collections. That is an extra step that causes inefficiency for me as an administrator, and could have a business impact on end users who rely on the solution if I forget to take that extra step.
Folders are also just a more understandable solution. If i need to communicate with Admins or end users about where their information is - everyone understands what a folder is. They don't know what a "Collection" is. I have to spend time explaining to our administrators and users the difference between a Workspace, a folder, and a collection. We don't have time to continually educate users. We want a frictionless experience for our users. We want functionality that works like all the other software we use, so we don't need to create a new mental model just for Smartsheet.
Yes, we need Folder Level Permissions. This is a MASSIVE miss to not have this. Collections is all well and good but that is only for enterprise users. There is no reason this shouldn't be a simple function for all users. I am probably the biggest Smartsheet fanboy but the lack of this is terrible!
Agreed, with out the folder option this is useless. i can't share all the backend reports and have them show without being in a folder it will crowd users "sheets" folder. this was poorly designed.
It would be great if we had the ability to share folders with users in the same way that we can with Workspaces. It would greatly enhance organization and workspace management.
There are many situations in which a workspace needs to be shared with a core team while subfolders within that workspace need to be shared with a larger/different audience. I'm sure most, if not all, of your customers would appreciate this functionality.
Folder level permissions are still needed. Collections doesn't answer this question without several workarounds.
Hi @Genevieve P.
Are you able to shed any light on when Collections will be enhanced? There are two major drawbacks preventing us from rolling this out.
There is a lengthy conversation regarding Collections at Collections vs Work Apps - Smartsheet Community - It's been 12 months now and the Source Sheet/Report issue still is yet to be resolved.
Thanks and have a good weekend.
Hi @Richard Heath,
Here's the Product Idea regarding Reports and sharing the source sheet which is confirmed to be on the roadmap: Sharing reports with data without even view access to the source sheet
In regards to navigating to a Collection, there are a couple of options that may be helpful:
In the meantime, to pass along your feedback to the appropriate team, please feel free to vote and comment on this related thread: View Collections from the Browse Screen
You can also provide feedback through the dropdown menu in a Collection:
Thanks! Genevieve
Hi adding a slightly different perspective to this thread. My organization requires permissions to be set at the folder level so different user groups can be editors/creators of their own content within that folder but not for the overall workspace. This is not related to collections.
For example, we have admins that manage the overall workspace for a program and several teams manage projects within the program that we would like to set appropriate permissions for their own folders but not everyone else's. It is not practical for admins to manually create items on their behalf then assign them as Editors on a sheet by sheet basis. The governing structure suggests I grant them viewer access to the workspace so that they can't edit what isn't theirs, but that leaves our admins with added work and more tedious oversight.
Same here. I need to only give admin access to other users on certain folders. It's very annoying and tedious to grant them admin access to each sheet individually. Collections is still extra work, and people can't find the collection.
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