ArchWiki:Access levels and roles

ArchWiki uses two types of MediaWiki groups in order to independently define the access level and the role of each user. Compared to the common way where each group has its own set of permissions, this approach is more flexible and allows to fine-tune access levels for each user independently of their roles.

Access levels

Access levels are groups with a non-empty set of granted rights: their purpose is to define the extent of the permissions that users have in the wiki.

The following access levels are assigned automatically by MediaWiki:

• user is the default group for all users, which grants the basic read/write permissions.
• autoconfirmed is a group for users with at least 20 edits and 3 days since their account creation [1]. Before these thresholds are reached, user actions are subject to some restrictions aimed at preventing spam attacks.

The following access levels can be assigned temporarily by a bureaucrat to members of specific roles who may request it. They can be assigned permanently only after internal discussion and approval by the administrators, for example following the acquisition or change of a role, or to address specifically-justified individual needs:

• cosysop is a group for trusted community members which also allows editing most protected pages such as those in the DeveloperWiki namespace.
• sysop is a group for highly trusted users who are responsible for critical wiki-administrative tasks like page deletion or user blocking, thus requiring the demonstration of extensive knowledge of how the wiki is organized. They also have all rights of the checkuser group which is created automatically by MediaWiki.
• bureaucrat is a group for sysops who can grant access levels and roles to other users.
• bot is a group for ArchWiki:Bots.

Roles

Roles are groups with an empty set of granted rights: their purpose is to clarify the function of wiki users within the Arch community. While members of specific roles may be granted an access level by default, the administration team reserves the right to make ad-hoc variations to the default assignments.

• maintainer is a group for the ArchWiki:Maintenance Team members.
  • All maintainers are given the cosysop access level by default. Maintainers with the sysop access level are called administrators.
• translator is a group for active members of an ArchWiki Translation Team.
• archdev is a group for Arch Developers.
  • All archdevs are given the cosysop access level by default.
• archtu is a group for Arch Trusted Users.
• archstaff is a group for users with other roles within the Arch Linux community.

See also

• Original pull request