kField project roles
A project collaborator can be set to one of five roles. Here is what each role can and cannot do, and which one is right for which kind of person on your team.
Admin
Full control of the project: settings, files, members, credentials, everything. Typically the project owner or the person responsible for it end to end.
Manager
Senior engineer or supervisor. Same as Admin except cannot create or delete project-level credentials.
Editor
Trusted field officer or GIS specialist. Captures features, uploads files, and can clean up incorrect files. Cannot change project settings or approve other people's edits.
Reporter
Default field officer. Can capture new features and upload supporting files, but cannot delete anything that someone else uploaded.
Reader
Read-only viewer. Can open the project and see its data but cannot capture, edit, or upload anything. Typical for a business stakeholder or auditor.
| Capability | Admin | Manager | Editor | Reporter | Reader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Access the project | |||||
| Open the project (mobile or desktop) | YES | YES | YES | YES | YES |
| View project details and metadata | YES | YES | YES | YES | YES |
| Project settings | |||||
| Update project settings (name, description, public flag) | YES | YES | NO | NO | NO |
| Delete the project | YES | YES | NO | NO | NO |
| Add or remove project collaborators | YES | YES | NO | NO | NO |
| Files | |||||
| Read and download project files | YES | YES | YES | YES | YES |
| Upload new files (photos, audio, attachments) | YES | YES | YES | YES | NO |
| Delete project files | YES | YES | YES | NO | NO |
| Modify the QGIS project file (.qgs / .qgz) directly | YES | YES | In limited cases | In limited cases | NO |
| Clean up unnecessary old file versions | YES | NO | NO | NO | NO |
| Captures and synced edits | |||||
| Capture new features in the field (create synced edits) | YES | YES | YES | YES | NO |
| View the project's full synced-edit history | YES | YES | YES | YES | NO |
| Apply pending edits to the project | YES | YES | NO | NO | NO |
| Approve, reject, or override edit status | YES | YES | NO | NO | NO |
| Background processing jobs | |||||
| View the project's processing jobs | YES | YES | YES | YES | NO |
| Project-level credentials (database connections, API keys) | |||||
| Create project-level credentials | YES | NO | NO | NO | NO |
| Delete project-level credentials | YES | NO | NO | NO | NO |
Notes
- Pick the lowest role that does the job. Default new field officers to Reporter. Promote them to Editor only when they are trusted to clean up incorrect files. Reserve Manager and Admin for project leads.
- Admin vs Manager: functionally near-identical; Manager cannot manage project credentials (database passwords, API keys), Admin can. Use Manager for senior engineers who run the project day to day, Admin for the person who set up the connection to your back-office systems.
- Editor vs Reporter: the only difference is that Editor can delete files. Use Reporter for crews that submit data; use Editor when someone in the crew also does light QA and removes obviously-bad uploads (e.g. corrupted photos).
- Reader is read-only. They cannot capture features in the field. If you give a field officer Reader by mistake, they can pull the project on the phone but every save will fail. Use Reader for office-based reviewers, auditors, or external stakeholders.
- Modifying the QGIS project file (the .qgs / .qgz that defines layers, forms, and styles) is normally an Admin or Manager task done from QGIS desktop. Editor and Reporter can do it only in limited cases (typically when they are also the project owner or when the project is configured to allow it).
- Org-level role overrides project role. An Admin in the parent organization (Org Owner or Member with Admin role) automatically gets Admin-level access to every project in that organization, even without an explicit collaborator entry. See the organization roles guide.