Modifying many permissions of many users at once

Question

I’m trying to set up a system where an admin can edit the permissions of many users in an app. There may be 1000 users in the app and there may be 10-20 permissions. Permissions would be things like:

• Can a user edit files
• Can a user delete files
• Can a user create discussions
• etc.

So usually the permissions are yes/no when phrased as questions — so a checkbox can be used here.

The idea at the moment is to use a table which would display a left column with the list of users, and a table header that would display the permissions horizontally.

The table header would be fixed so you could scroll vertically and still see the permission that is checked/unchecked. The left column with the users would also be fixed so when scrolling horizontally you can see which permissions apply to which user.

Here is a mockup to illustrate this idea:

I think this is a good idea but I was wondering of there was any other effective approaches to this type of problem? Any suggestions on how I could improve this/approach it a different way would be great.

Answer 1

Funny you should ask this, because this is almost exactly the same approach I have in my web application.

To make it easier on your administrator, have a search box at the top that accepts either username (i.e. email username/login username) or full name. Then, when the administrator needs to manage a particular user, he/she searches for the user's name and adds it.

Also, ask yourself if you will only have a limited number of permissions. If your permission count goes up, will you be able to fit everything in one table?

In my application, I have a modular concept of groups, where a group can be added/removed at any time. Permissions are assigned to the groups, and users are assigned to the groups. It looks roughly like this:

+------------+---------+---+---+
| Permission | Group A | B | C |
+------------+---------+---+---+
| Edit Files |     ☑   | ☑ | ☑ |
+------------+---------+---+---+
|Delete Files|     ☑   | ☑ | ☑ |
+------------+---------+---+---+
| Add Files  |     ☑   | ☑ | ☑ |
+------------+---------+---+---+
              .
              .
              .

Then, the users/group matrix looks exactly like you have in your mock-up, except where you have permissions, I have groups of permissions.