Approval workflow: review before publishing Pro
Turn on the approval gate so authors submit documents for review and someone with publishing rights approves and publishes them.
The approval gate adds a "submit for review → approve & publish" step to the FileDeck document editor. With it enabled, authors submit their documents for review instead of publishing directly, and a user with publishing rights checks the document and publishes it. Nothing goes live in your library until someone with the right permissions has signed off.
FileDeck Pro — this feature is included in all Pro plans. See pricing
How do I turn on the approval gate?
- Go to Documents → Settings → Lifecycle.
- Enable Approval gate.
- Save your changes.
From then on, the document editor offers the submit-for-review flow to authors who cannot publish, and the approve-and-publish action to those who can.
How does the workflow run day to day?
- An author creates a document as usual — title, file, description, categories — and submits it for review.
- The document waits as a submission rather than appearing in your libraries.
- A user with publishing rights opens the document, checks it, and approves and publishes it.
Who counts as an approver follows WordPress’s own permissions: anyone whose role can publish (Editors and Administrators on a default setup) can approve. Authors and Contributors submit; they cannot push a document live on their own.
What is this workflow for?
The approval gate is deliberately lightweight — one gate, not a workflow designer. There are no multi-stage sign-off chains, routing rules, or per-category approvers. If your requirement is "nobody publishes a document without a second pair of eyes," this covers it with a single checkbox. Teams that pair it with review cycles get both ends of the lifecycle: a check before a document goes live, and scheduled re-checks after.
FAQ
Does the approval gate affect documents that are already published?
No. Existing published documents stay published. The gate applies when documents are created or resubmitted through the editor.
Can I have different approvers for different categories?
No. The gate is intentionally simple: one gate for the whole library, with approval rights following WordPress publishing permissions.
Can approvers edit a submission before publishing it?
Yes. An approver can open the submitted document, fix the title, description, or file, and then approve and publish it in one sitting.
Still stuck? Email [email protected].