A Confluence Setup to Restrict Forum Usage to Certain Outside Users
Asked by IDOE:

In part of a Confluence space, I'm looking to design a forum with a specific setup in mind. Yes, I'm aware there are several forum apps for Confluence out there that can be hosted on any page, but I specifically need to have a forum where users would only be able to join the Forum with a specific link. (either a join link to the forum app, or a join link to that page)

With that latter in mind, I saw that Confluence is currently exploring a public link option (<https://support.atlassian.com/confluence-cloud/docs/share-content-externally-with-public-links/>), which could be an answer, but I'm wondering if the barrier I'm running into is that setting space/page permissions on Confluence can only be done if you can insert the emails of Confluence users. The problem is here is that the forum users would not have Confluence accounts.

Any advice you could offer would be appreciated.

--Nate


Answers:
author: Trudy Claspill
body: Hello [@IDOE](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/5090300)

What do you want your forum users to be able to do with Confluence?

The Public Link option you refer to is to provide View Only access to a page. People who receive that link can only view that one page. Functionality not available includes:

* Edit the page.

* Comment inline or on the page.

* View inline or page comments.

* See the Confluence navigation.

* See the page tree and page breadcrumbs.

* Most macros, including those that contain data outside of the shared page and all third party macros.

If you want the individuals to be able to interact with the content besides viewing it you have few choices:

1. Make them licensed users and restrict their access to only the spaces/content they need.

2. Consider the [Guest User option](https://support.atlassian.com/confluence-cloud/docs/invite-guests-for-external-collaboration/) if you don't want to pay for licenses for these users.

3. Consider a third party app that will enable you to share content with external individuals without granting them a user license and also enabling some minimal interaction with the content. I recently learned about this app:

[External Share for Confluence](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1220562/external-share-for-confluence?hosting=cloud&tab=overview)

comments: author: IDOE
body: Hey Trudy,   

So I'm looking for a forum setup like so:  
1) Outside users can utilize the forum without Confluence accounts (the Guest User option is a good idea, but this forum would serve easily over 1000 individuals, so that's not really an option as it limits the Guests Users to 5 per account").

2) Access to the forum (at least in terms of posting) is restricted by a SSO or by shareable link. This part is a must, as my client needs to make sure only the appropriate users are approved. The problem is is that we can't manually input these via email, as the users are shifting depending on hiring, need, etc). Essentially, we would need a system where users could request access, provide an email, and then a link would be shared by us/an app.  

3. Users must be able to interact with the forum, not simply see what is there. Unfortunately, this means that the "External Share for Confluence" that you mentioned would not work.


author: Trudy Claspill
body: Hello Nate,

What type of "interaction" specifically must be enabled? You said "posting" but what does that mean? Posting what, exactly? Pages, comments, blogs, attachments, ...? The "External Share for Confluence" app supports commenting and adding attachments, but not adding pages or blogs.

I am not aware of any other methods than the ones I have listed where you can enable people to do more than just view the Confluence content.


Tags: cloud

confluence-cloud

forum