Can i restrict editing in columns of a table?
Asked by Devo:

I would like to create a table, which uses task-lists and checkboxes.

I need the ability to protect some columns/lines from editing by all except the owner.


Answers:
author: Nic Brough -Adaptavist-
body: Permissions are done at a page level in Confluence. If you can edit a page, you can edit all of it. Also, Confluence doesn't have the concept of roles like "owner", permissions are by group or individual.

comments: author: Robert Reiner _smartics_
body: Adding to Nic's answer: If each user has write access on their pages, but can read everyone else's, you can use excerpt / transclusion macros to render information from these pages on other pages.

Maybe the [Page Properties Macro](https://confluence.atlassian.com/conf53/page-properties-macro-411108615.html) and the [Excerpt Macro](https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/excerpt-macro-148062.html) may support your use cases out-of-the-box. If not, there are third party add-ons to support [multi-excerpt](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/search?query=multi-excerpt) or other handy features to grab information from one or more read-only pages to render it in another page.

One solution could be the Display Table Macro from the commercial [projectdoc Toolbox](https://www.smartics.eu/confluence/x/1YEp) for Confluence server. Every line of a table would be stored in a properties table (using the [Document Properties Marker Macro](https://www.smartics.eu/confluence/x/rgNk)) on its own page (for instance tasks with some metadata like owner, short description, and due date). The [Display Table Macro](https://www.smartics.eu/confluence/x/wgNk) allows then to list all (matching) pages on one table (such as the overview over tasks that selects information from all matching task pages).

Two things (at least ;-)) to consider:

1. Having each table row as a separate document may sound unfamiliar. But it may be quite natural if you think of tasks and list of tasks. Each task, since it is on its own page, can be referenced individually (which would be harder if one would need to reference a row in a table).
2. If you want to change a table row a user would need to navigate to the document that is the source for that line and edit it there.

Biased alert: I'm one of the authors of the projectdoc Toolbox (which is [available on the Atlassian Marketplace](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/1212629)). The [online manual](https://www.smartics.eu/confluence/x/EAFk) provides more information about the tools of the projectdoc Toolbox.


author: Devo
body: Thanks, but this is not what i asked for.

I would like to create a table, where:

1. Some columns can be modified only by the originator, and

other users can only read them.

2. Other columns are writable by any permitted user.


author: Robert Reiner _smartics_
body: You need to find a solution, where the data for the restricted columns is not stored as part of the page. This is because - as Nic explained - a user either has certain privileges on a page or not.

Therefore the mentioned solution using transclusion/excerpt is a valid approach. If this does not fit your requirements I suppose you need to find or write a plugin that stores column data apart from the page. I do not know of such a tool.


author: Katerina Rudkovskaya [Stiltsoft]
body: Hello,

You can do it with the help of the Table Transformer macro of [Table Filter and Charts for Confluence](https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/27447/table-filter-and-charts-for-confluence?hosting=cloud&tab=overview) and standart [Excerpt (Include).](https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/excerpt-macro-148062.html)

You need to divide you data into two pages. The first one should contain data which are available for public editing. And the secound one should include only those data which other users can't edit. Here on the second page you need to apply appropriate restrictions for it and wrap data with the Excerpt macro.

![Screenshot_1.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96652iA26E082691CD083E/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_1.png")![Screenshot_5.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96653iC75FD9F24AEA598A/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_5.png")![Screenshot_6.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96654iA16B5FB9E5B9FDA1/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_6.png")  

Then you should insert Excerpt Include on the page with data available for editing and merge data of both tables with the help of our Table Transformer macro.

![Screenshot_2.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96656i79E29FC5CEE00E0B/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_2.png")![Screenshot_3.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96659iC89BD73B989F5DC6/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_3.png")![Screenshot_4.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/96658iDE69C32A161E6F3B/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot_4.png")  

Thus, other users won't be able to edit restricted columns on both pages.  

Katerina  
StiltSoft


Tags: filter

table

table-excerpt

table-filter

table-filter-and-charts