Reviews are the core of CoLab - they are where you can collect feedback on a file or set of files, assign specific reviewers, and ensure you have a history of actions taken as needed.
To start a review, you will need to have a Workspace and one or more files in that Workspace. If you're not at that stage yet, you can read more on creating Workspaces, and on uploading files throughout our knowledge base.
You can create a review in three ways in CoLab. Most reviews will be created from a Workspace or Portal, or from a file within one of those. Occasionally, you will also want to create a review directly from your Home page.
Note: By default, portal guests cannot create reviews in a portal. They will have the ability to do this if they have been assigned a custom role with the relevant permissions configured. For more details on configurable permissions, see "Using configurable permissions & custom roles".
Creating a review
There are a number of ways to create a new review from a Workspace or Portal:
Right-click on a single file in the workspace drive and select "Request review."
Select multiple files by first choosing the "select multiple" option at the top of Drive, and either:
right-click on one of the selected files to choose "Request review" from the menu.
or click on the "Request review" option in the bottom options bar that appears when multiple files are selected.
Open any file directly and click on "Request Review" in the top right corner of the screen to do the same.
Select the "Create" option on the workspace homepage. This option will let you create a review without attaching a file until after it is created.
Whichever method you choose, you will be presented with a modal to enter details about your review.
The only requirement of this page is to add a review title, but you can optionally add both a start and a due date for the review, assign relevant checklists, and add a description for reviewers to understand the goals of the review.
You can also optionally use a Review Template by clicking on the "Select a template" option at the top of the modal, and choosing a template to apply.
When you've added the details you want to add, click Next. On the next page, you'll invite reviewers, who are responsible for adding feedback and engaging in the review as a whole.
You can also invite review owners, who are generally those responsible for ensuring the review is complete and for driving the outcomes involved. Review owners do not have separate permissions applied to them by default but can have them added through custom roles.
Note: By default, review owners are not also reviewers. To ensure that review owners are also able to contribute their feedback to and submit reviews, it is recommended that you add them as reviewers as well.
For reviews that contain multiple files, you will be presented with a third page of options that allows you to re-order files for the review. This will set the order that the files are displayed in the review panel.
If you chose to create your review using the "Create" option on your workspace home page, you will have no files pre-selected. Therefore, the third page in the review set up will allow you to add files to the review. This will be followed by a fourth page allowing you to re-order the selected files.
When you are finished the review set-up steps, click the 'Send for review' button to initiate the review.
Adding a file to an existing review
You are still able to add additional files to reviews after they have been created. To do this:
Open the review panel from the right sidebar.
Select the review and click on the file details tab.
Click on the "+" symbol in the "Files for review" section.
This will open a modal that allows you to select an existing file in your workspace drive, or to upload an entirely new file to add to the review.