start approve without approve permission

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Posted on by chhe

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Hello,

I use the "send to approval" function for new or edited pages in SharePoint online. A user who creates new pages or edit pages has no permission to approve a page. The 3-steps-workflow (draft, assigned, approved) is enabled in sharepoint.

If a user sends a page to approval a flow worklow starts. After start a approval there is a condition. If the result is "approve" the next step "set content approve status" fails. There comes an error message: "access denied". But the same step of "set content approve status" that sets the status to "submit" works well.

I dont want to give every user the permission to approve - then the workflow will work. Because I dont want that every user can see pages in draft status.

Is there a solution?

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Pstork1 68,271 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

The content approval settings are holdovers form the days of SharePoint publishing, but if you are approving pages then they should still be used. Unfortunately, to set content approval status does require that the user doing the approving has Approver permissions. There is no way to get around that. That's why you get access denied when setting it to Approve and don't when setting it to Submit. To Submit a page doesn't require approver permission. To approve it does. If you want to hide draft pages then you'll have to either restrict your group of approvers or live with everyone seeing the drafts. That's just he way its designed to work.

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chhe 140 on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

But the person who receives the email with the approval has approval permission. Only the person who send this page to approval has no approval rights. That is the point I do not understand. It is like Sharepoint requires that the person who only click on "send to approval" must have approval permission too. And I don't think that this is right.

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Pstork1 68,271 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

The problem is that the person who sends the approval is the one supplying the context for the change. So they will need approver permissions. As I said, this was designed to be used with the older workflow, which ran as the system account, not Flow which runs as the user who creates the flow or the one who starts the flow manually. That's why the permission model doesn't match.

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chhe 140 on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

Okay and is there a work a round for this problem?

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Pstork1 68,271 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

The normal work around is to use an automated trigger like When a File is created or modified. That way the flow runs using the permissions of the flow maker, so that person is the only one who needs approver permission. It sounds like you are having the person who edits the page start the approval manually. The only other option is to give all the people with edit permission to pages the approver permission as well.

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chhe 140 on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

Yes, the person who edits the page runs the flow manually by clicking on the button "send to approval" (see screenshot).

I have tested the trigger "when a file is created or modified" but the problem is here, that the flow runs if the page is saved due automatically save or save by the user as a draft. And it is possible that the user works on several days at this page and the flow should only run if the user want to start it otherwise the page is not completed and the flow runs.

I have given all user approver permission. But the bad thing is that they can see now all pages in draft status. Is there maybe a setting that they only can see there own pages in draft?

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Pstork1 68,271 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

There is a setting like that for List Items, but not for Files (Pages).

You could still use the automated trigger, but add a metadata field to the Pages that specifies whether it has been submitted for approval or not. Then filter the trigger for that condition so it only fires when the page has been marked as submitted for approval.

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chhe 140 on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

Okay, but does the user have to edit the metadata field manually? Or is this updated automatically if the page is submitted for approval? How can I create such a metadata field?

And the screenshot shows the properties of "when a file is created or modified". Is that the right place to filter the trigger?

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Pstork1 68,271 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

Yes, they need to update the content approval column using the Update Content Approval action. And you have identified the right location for adding a trigger filter.

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chhe 140 on at

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Re: start approve without approve permission

Okay, do you mean with "Update Content Approval" the button I marked in the screenshot below? Could you please help me to create the right trigger filter?

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