Setting, viewing and changing an annotation’s author:
When you create an annotation, Re:mark uses the contents of Acrobat’s Default Label attribute as its author. (The Default Label attribute can be accessed from Acrobat’s Note Preferences dialog. Choose File | Preferences | Notes. If the Default Label field is blank, Re:mark uses the value “Unknown” instead.)
An annotation’s author may be seen in a variety of places, including the labels of its associated comment box and properties dialog, in Re:mark end-notes if the annotation is rendered, and with the Annotation Manager. The author may be changed from the Annotation Security dialog as follows:
1. Select the annotation by clicking on it.
2. Click with the right mouse button and choose Properties from the pop-up menu, or choose Edit | Properties from the Acrobat menu bar.
3. Click on the Security button to bring up the Annotation Security dialog.
4. Change the author name as appropriate, and click OK.
5. Click OK to exit from the properties dialog.
Note that changing an annotation’s author may cause a different set of security permissions to be applied when the annotation is accessed. Note also that changing the author does not affect the annotation’s passwords (if any).
Annotation Security 140 Author versus Others access permissions:
There is separate Re:mark annotation security for the annotation’s author and for everyone else.
The Annotation Security dialog has two columns of permissions: the left column is used when the annotation’s author and Acrobat’s Default Label attribute are the same, and the right column is used when they differ. In general, you use the left column to control access and changes to annotations that you create, and use the right column to control other people’s access to these annotations. To the extent that you are allowed to do so, you also use the right column to control access to annotations that other people have created.
Note: By default, anyone can become the "author" of your annotations simply by changing the Acrobat Default Label attribute to match your ID. Your ID is displayed whenever your annotations are accessed or rendered. If you wish to restrict access to your annotations, it is important that you require a password or specify No Access for the author, as well as for others, in the Annotation Security dialog box.
Individual access controls:
Using the Annotation Security dialog, you can separately control permissions to read, modify, delete, render and set the security for an annotation. (These permissions are for the annotation’s author or for all others, depending on which column is being used.) For any one of these
operations, you have three choices of controls: Unrestricted, Password and No Access. The significance of these choices is as follows:
• Unrestricted – The users are permitted to perform the associated operation without restriction.
• Password – The users are permitted to perform the associated operation if and only if they have first entered the necessary password. (If a user has not already entered the password, he or she is prompted for the password at the time the operation is attempted.)
• No Access – The users are not permitted to perform the associated operation.
In short, a user is not permitted to perform a particular operation, for that annotation, if the corresponding permission is No Access, or if the permission is Password but the user doesn’t know the password. The effects to the user depend on the operation(s) that are denied:
• Read – Affected users are not allowed to read the contents of the annotation’s comment box.
If Read is set to No Access (possible only for users other than the author), the annotation is invisible to those users. No rendition of the annotation is displayed on the document page, the cursor does not change when it is moved over the annotation, the annotation can not be selected or seen with the Annotation Manager, and can not be rendered. Note that if
annotations are imported from this document, this annotation will be included along with its security settings.
• Modify – Affected users are not allowed to edit the contents of the annotation’s comment box, move the annotation, or change its security settings or other properties (e.g., color).
• Delete – Affected users are not allowed to delete the annotation.
• Render – Affected users are not allowed to render the annotation. You use this option if you don’t want the users to be able to print or otherwise distribute the contents of the annotation in PDF or PostScript form.
• Set Security – Affected users are not allowed to view or change the annotation’s security settings.
Combining individual access permissions:
The access permissions above are used separately but are combined to achieve the necessary effects. Some combinations of settings are not valid. The Annotation Security dialog has rules about which combinations make sense and which don’t. It prohibits certain settings, and adjusts settings in response to user selections. Here is the basic logic that it uses:
Annotation Security 142 1. As author of the annotation, you can always read it. (You may require a password.)
2. As author of the annotation, you can always change its security. (You may require a password.)
3. If you can set the annotation’s security, you must be able to read it. (You may require a password.)
4. You can always set the security that you require for your own access to the annotation, and the security used for other people who access the annotation. Other users can only change the security settings used for themselves (if you permit that), but not for you.
5. Anyone who is authorized to modify, delete or render the annotation, or to view or change its security settings, must be able to read the annotation. If they can’t read the annotation, they can’t change it.
6. If you require a password to read, modify, delete or render the annotation, then a password must be required to set its security.
7. If you require a password to read the annotation, then a password must be required to modify, delete or render it.
In general, permission to set security must be as or more restrictive than permission to modify, delete and render the annotation, and permission to modify, delete and render it must be as or more restrictive than permission to read it. For example, this combination is valid when setting access permissions for Others:
• Read = Unrestricted
• Modify = Password
• Delete = Password
• Render = Password
• Set Security = No Access
The following combination is not valid, because permission to set security is less restrictive than
The following combination is also not valid, because it’s possible to change or delete the annotation without being able to read it:
• Read = Password
• Modify = Unrestricted
• Delete = Unrestricted
• Render = No Access
• Set Security = No Access
The Annotation Security dialog uses these rules to dynamically adjust permissions that you might have set, and to limit the options that you have, depending on the choices that you have made.
1. If you are the annotation’s author, the dialog does not permit you to set Read or Set Security permission to No Access.
2. If you are not the annotation’s author, the dialog lets you see but not change the access controls for the author. (The author’s security permissions are grayed out.)
3. If you change the annotation’s security settings so that a password is required to read it, the dialog sets any Unrestricted operations, in that same column, to require a password as well.
(For example, if Read = Unrestricted and Modify = Unrestricted, and you set Read = Password, then the dialog automatically sets Modify = Password.)
Annotation Security 144 4. If you change the annotation’s security settings so that read is not permitted (you can only do
this for the Others column), then permissions for all other operations in that column are automatically set to No Access. If you click OK, this will make the annotation invisible to everyone but its author.
5. If you change the permission to set security to be less restrictive than the read permission, the dialog automatically adjusts the read access permission to be the same. (For example, if Read = No Access and Security = No Access, and you set Security = Password, then the dialog automatically sets Read = Password.)
If these rules sound a little complicated, experiment until you feel comfortable with the internal logic of Annotation Security. You’ll probably find it more natural if you set the Author’s privileges before Others and, in any given column, if you set Read permission first, then Set Security, then the others.