TDX Knowledge: Article Status and Lifecycle Overview

The lifecycle of a Knowledge Base article begins with a Not Submitted article and progresses through when an article is archived. You can see where an article is in the lifecycle by referring to its Status.

You can see the Status of an article when searching for knowledge from an Incident:
The KB Article lookup window from an Incident form with the Status column highlighted.

The Status also shows in the Details area in the right column of an article when viewing it directly in the Knowledge Base.
A knowledge article with the Status: Archived area highlighted in the Details.

Understanding article Status

  • Not Submitted: A draft or work-in-progress article 
    • Any technician in TDX can create a Not Submitted article, either from an incident or from the Knowledge Base.
    • Technicians can continue to edit their own articles as long as the article is Not Submitted
    • Technicians can change the Owner of their Not Submitted articles to their Group; then anyone in the Group can work on the article.
  • Submitted: An article that is ready for editor review
    • Submitted articles can be found in the Articles Pending Review Knowledge Base menu.
    • Group Knowledge Editors can edit and approve Submitted articles owned by their Group.
    • Global Knowledge Editors can edit and approve any Submitted article.
      Note: Global Knowledge Editors should ALWAYS communicate with the appropriate stakeholders before approving knowledge.
  • Approved: An article that is has been fully vetted and approved for use by an editor
    • Editors should use the Checklist for Internal and Public-Facing Knowledge.
    • Group Knowledge Editors can continue to edit Approved articles owned by their Group, unless they are also Published (see below).
    • Global Knowledge Editors can continue to edit any Approved articles.
      Note: Global Knowledge Editors should ALWAYS communicate with the appropriate stakeholders before editing knowledge.
    • Only Approved articles display when a technician uses the Categories to browse the Knowledge Base.
      • For this reason, Work in Progress (WIP) articles are also set to the Approved status. WIP articles are denoted by WORK IN PROGRESS: at the beginning of their titles.
  • Rejected: An article that has been rejected for approval by an editor
    • Note: While rejected articles can be edited by editors, someone without editing ability will not be able to make changes to a rejected article. If an editor wants a technician to modify and resubmit a rejected article, the editor should first reject the article, then manually change the status back to Not Submitted.
  • Archived: An article that has been retired from the Knowledge Base
    • Archived articles continue to show up in knowledge searches, but are clearly marked as such. 
    • Archived articles cannot also be Published (see below). 

Publishing Approved Articles

Approved articles that are also Published to KB are available to users via the Technology Help website (it.umn.edu) as well as via the Client Portal in TDX. 

  • Published to KB is not an article Status, but is a separate flag Global Knowledge Editors can apply to an article.
  • Only Approved articles can be Published to KB.
  • Articles that are restricted to viewing only by the University community can still be Published to KB which makes them available in the TDX Client Portal but they will not be published to a website.
  • Global Knowledge Editors should ALWAYS communicate with the appropriate stakeholders before publishing knowledge and should follow the Checklist for Internal and Public-Facing Knowledge.

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