When to take ownership of an item
When you want to edit an item, you may see this message: "The item may already contain uncommitted changes." This help topic helps you decide what to do with this information.
Your organization may impose a workflow process on some types of content. Such types of content item must undergo a number of workflow steps. Only after all of these steps are finished, will the new version of the content item be created.
- an edit by an author
- a review by a subject matter expert (SME)
Now also imagine a specific content item, let's say, a Component called "Legal Terms and Conditions," currently at version 2, that needs to be modified. For example, the legal disclaimer text needs to be modified.
First, the author edits the Component in the editor, changing the disclaimer text, and selects Finish. Experience Space saves the author's changes in a version 2.1 of the Component, but does not yet commit those changes, because the workflow process is not yet finished. The item can now be reviewed by an SME.
- The SME could review the content and make any corrections, and then select Finish. Experience Space saves the SME's changes and creates a version 3 of the Component, committing both the author's changes and the SME changes.
- The SME could decide (for whatever reason) to select Discard changes. Selecting this option discards not just the SME's own work, but also the author's. The Component is back at version 2.
Either way, from the moment the SME starts editing the Component, the SME takes ownership of all changes made to the Component --including changes made by others.
In short: if you see the message "The item may already contain uncommitted changes" when you try to edit a content item, consider whether you want to take ownership of any changes already made by another user or users. If you are comfortable taking ownership, proceed; if you are not comfortable, abandon your edit.