Creating a composite group

Groups can be "nested" or combined as "composite groups", consisting of two or more "subgroups". Any existing group can be used as a subgroup within a composite group. These composite groups can be created to make the administration of authorizations and permissions of users easier and more efficient.

To create a composite group, use this procedure:

  1. Open the Groups form.
  2. Perform one of these actions:
    • To use an existing group as the composite group, select the group from the Group Name column of the grid view.
      Note: This is not generally a good practice, unless you know exactly the permissions granted to the group or that group is newly created. Changing any permissions to a group changes all uses of that group by all users. We recommend that, if you want to use a group as a composite group, you create a new group or copy an existing group.
    • To create a new group to serve as the composite group, create it as you would any other group.

      See Creating a user group.

    Note: When naming the composite group, we also recommend either that you use a naming convention to identify it as a composite group; or that you provide a Group Description that identifies it as a composite group.
  3. Verify that a group that you want to use as a subgroup to the composite group exists.
    If that group does not exist, then you must create it before you use it as part of the composite group.
    Note: You can use multiple groups as subgroups. You can also use subgroups as composite groups within parent composite groups. In other words, you can nest composite groups as subgroups inside other composite groups.
  4. Save the new composite group.