What to do first
Search. The box looks across titles, the text inside a document, and what each document is attached to, so a client's name finds the documents filed against that client. It also finds lessons: any that match show as a Lessons: row above the list, each opening its lesson.
To browse instead, use the categories across the top, or My department.
Categories and departments
Your workspace files its library its own way. The chips across the top are your workspace's categories ("Sales playbooks", "Site safety", "Onboarding"), with Uncategorised for anything not yet filed. Each carries a count.
A document can also say which department it is for. My department narrows the list to yours in one tap, and Every department picks any other. This is for finding documents, not hiding them: everybody can still read a document filed for another department.
Anybody can add a category: choose + Add a category above the list, or add a new one while adding a document. Managers can also rename and remove them with Edit categories. Removing a category leaves its documents uncategorised; nothing is deleted.
Every document also has a type: procedure, policy, entitlement, or any type your workspace types in, such as "Training manual". A new type joins the list for everybody as soon as one document uses it. Filter by type with Every type, or with the chips if your workspace has no categories yet.
Adding a document
Add a document, then choose how:
- Upload a file. A PDF, image, Word or Excel file, up to 4.5 MB, kept privately inside your workspace. Anything bigger, such as a training video or a long handbook, goes in Google Drive, Dropbox or YouTube and is added as a link: pick a file over the limit and the sheet says so straight away, with Add it as a link.
- Link or embed. A YouTube or Vimeo video, a Google Doc or Drive file, any web page, or any file over 4.5 MB. As you paste it, the sheet says whether it will play or show in the library or open in a new tab. A link has to be a web address that starts with http or https.
- Write it here. A procedure or policy typed straight into Rople.
Then give it a title, a type (pick one or type a new one), a category (pick one or add a new one), the department it is for, and any notes: why it matters, what it replaces, who to ask. Notes show beside the document.
Reading a document without leaving
Opening a document shows it in place:
- PDFs open in your browser's own viewer.
- Images, video, audio and plain text show or play right there.
- Google Drive and Docs, YouTube and Vimeo links show in place.
- Word, Excel and PowerPoint files have no preview. The screen says so and offers the download, because previewing them would mean sending a private file to another company's viewer.
- Other links say what they are and open in a new tab, because most sites do not allow themselves to be shown inside another.
Read it full screen opens the same preview across the whole screen.
A document
Beside the preview: its version, when it was updated, who keeps it, its type, category and department, its notes, and where it came from if it was filed from somewhere else. A document written in Rople shows its paragraphs.
Beneath it is the Attached to block, listing the records this document belongs to: a client, a project, an inventory line, a purchase request. Those are links, so a document is a way into the records as well as the other way round.
At the foot:
- Archive this document takes it out of the library. It stays findable in search, and you can bring it back from Archive & trash in your profile menu.
- Remove this document deletes it for good and takes it off every record it is attached to. Team leads (level 2) and above can remove a document; archive it instead to keep a copy.
Into Development
A document that is a resource for developing people can go straight into the Development library. Choose Add to the Development library and fill in what Development asks: the kind of resource, the area of development, the skill it builds, how long it takes, and whether it is required when assigned. Pick one of Development's areas or type a new one.
The resource opens back to the document here, so there is still one document, and the document says In the Development library with a link to the resource. Managers, team leads and the workspace owner can do this: the same people who can add a resource in Development.
Documents that file themselves
Anything uploaded elsewhere in the workspace also appears here. A file attached to a task is reachable from that task and from this screen, and it is one file rather than two. That is why a document can say it arrived from somewhere, with the type "Filed from work", and why you rarely need to upload the same thing twice.
Lessons
Work › Knowledge › Lessons is what the company has learned, and where each lesson went. Three figures sit across the top: Lessons, Waiting on a procedure (asked for, not yet changed) and On development plans.
Most lessons are written when an issue is resolved: the close-out asks "Is there a lesson?" (see Quality and issues). Write a lesson adds one learned anywhere else, such as a project's close-out, a review or a near miss nobody raised. It asks for:
- The lesson, in a line, and More, if it helps.
- Update a procedure: a procedure from the library. Its owner is asked to change it, and the lesson waits until they have.
- Add to somebody's development plan: it becomes an objective on their plan, and they are told.
- Suggest a measure for next cycle, kept in words for the next round of goals.
Each lesson shows where it came from and where it went: the issue it was drawn from, its project, the procedure it Changes (or Changed, once done), whose plan it is on, and the measure it suggests. Search the list by lesson, procedure or project.
The Procedures
Organisation › Procedures lists the procedures the company runs on, each with its owner and how many lessons are waiting on it, and the lessons waiting for a procedure to change. A procedure is any document of type Procedure in the library.
When the procedure has been changed, its owner or a senior manager presses Procedure changed, and the lesson reads as landed. See Organisation.
Common questions
Somebody can see a document I cannot. Access follows your workspace's module access and the records a document is attached to. A document filed only against a record you cannot open is not one you can read.
Can I attach a document to more than one record? Yes. That is the point of the Attached to block. A procedure can belong to a project and to a department at once.
I uploaded a file in another module and cannot find it here. Filing happens after the upload has succeeded and is best effort, so a missed filing costs you one screen rather than the file. Search for the file name, and add it here by hand if it is genuinely absent.
Where did the Knowledge Base go? It is Work › Knowledge › Library, the same library under a new place in the sidebar.