Manage document versions
Versioning is a key part of content management. The documents that you work with in your business can go through many changes during their lifetime, and versioning information is provided to help manage your document content. The versions of a document provide a history of the changes the document has undergone from the time it was initially created. Document versions are created when you check a document in and out. A version is a document belonging to the Document class or one of the document subclasses. It represents the document as it existed at a particular time in its history, and is individually saved and maintained in an object store. When taken together, the different versions of a document become the version series for the document.
Some changes are not captured in a version:
- You can change the property values for a document version through its information page without creating new versions of the document.
- While you are editing a checked out document version, you can do a series of intermediate saves of the document's content before the subsequent checkin. The version does not maintain a history of these content saves. The version preserves only the content as it is at checkin time. For more information on saving a document without checking it in, see Save Document.
An icon next to a document indicates if the document is checked in or out, and indicates the version state of the checked out document. The major version number for the document is also displayed (unless removed by your site administrator). When you check out a document, you always check out the current version. The current version of a document is the most recent version in the version series. You can open and view other versions of the document from the document's Information or Properties page. You can promote, demote, or delete document versions.
For more information about document versions, see About versioning.
Promote a document version
You can promote the current minor version of a document to a major version without checking the document out and in. When you promote the version, the major version number is incremented by one and the minor version number is set to zero (0). For example, if version 0.1 is promoted, the version number becomes version 1.0 and no other version exists. If version 1.4 is promoted, the version number becomes version 2.0, version 1.4 no longer exists, but all other versions remain unchanged.
You cannot promote a document while it is checked out.
To promote a document version
- Navigate to the document you want to promote. Right-click the document and click More Actions > Promote Version.
- If needed, review the security policy if one is assigned. If no policy is currently assigned, you can click Assign Policy to assign a policy. See Security Policy for more information.
- Review the displayed security settings and make any needed changes. For more information, see Set Security Permissions.
- Click Accept to complete the action.
Demote a document version
You can demote the current major version of a document to a minor version without checking the document out and in. When you demote the version, the major version number is decremented by one and the minor version number is incremented by one. For example, if version 1.0 is demoted and there is an existing minor version 0.22, the version number becomes version 0.23. If version 4.0 is demoted and there are no existing minor versions, the version number becomes version 3.1.
You cannot demote a document while it is checked out.
To demote a document version
- Navigate to the document you want to demote. Right-click the document and click Demote Version.
- Click Accept to complete the action.
Delete a document version
If needed, you can delete a specific version of a document from a version series.
CAUTION When you delete a document version, the object is completely removed from the application. You cannot recover a deleted version of a document.
To delete specific versions of a document
- Navigate to the document whose version you want to delete. Right-click the document and click Delete Versions.
- On the Delete Versions page, select the Selected items check box to the left of the specific version or versions you want to delete. To select all listed versions, select the box in the title row of the list of items.
- Click Accept to complete the action.
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