User stories for approving content

After a review has been initiated, participants are notified by email that they have an approval task to complete in Workspace.

Approvers also receive emails that provide information about actions that occur during an approval. For example, in an approval stage, participants receive email when another approver has been added.

You can approve content using Workspace and Acrobat or Adobe Reader using one of the following options:

  • Use simple click-through approval.

  • Use digital signatures as part of the approval.

Common questions to ask to clarify requirements

  • Are digital signatures required for an approval?

  • How do you want users to approve content? In Workspace or using email?

  • Do you require an approval routing slip to capture final comments from approvers?

Requirements addressed

  • Support for digital and electronic signatures.

  • Use digital signatures to closing and signing off a review.

  • Support simple click-through approvals.

Tools used

  • Web browser with Flash Player 9 or later.

  • Workspace and email to participate in review and approval tasks.

  • Adobe Reader or Adobe Reader 9.2 or later for users to add comments and apply digital signatures.

  • LiveCycle Administration Console to configure users with email addresses and user roles. (See Review and approval personas and user roles .)

Team members and skill sets

  • Configure user profiles with email addresses and user roles. (IT Staff)

  • Modify approval routing slips (ARS) and signing sheets. (IT Staff, LiveCycle Developer)

Best practices, tips, and tricks

Approval stages are often configured at the end of the review and approval process but are not mandatory. Use click-through approval in approval stages in the middle of your workflow to simply the workflow.

When you deploy your solutions in an environment where LiveCycle is new, consider allowing users the option to complete approval tasks using email to ease migration. (See Alternate tools for interacting with processes in LiveCycle Workbench 9.5 Help . )

Apply digital signatures near the end of the review and approval workflow. For example, apply a digital signature after the review completes.

When you work with digital signatures, care must be taken to ensure that the signatures do not become invalid. For example, caution is required when you use postreview processes (sometimes called post-processing processes) after a digital signature has been applied to the review document. Any operation that changes the file, such as adding watermarks or adding pages must be done before applying the digital signature. In addition, some operations such as applying usage rights to a document, requires that digital signatures be applied in a specific order. Understanding how to use digital signatures is non-trivial. Take time to understand how digital signatures are used in LiveCycle and PDF documents by referring to the following resources:

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