Using Child Sites

A child site is a complete, standalone site that is isolated from all other child sites, but parent Site Administrators have unrestricted access to every child site's folders, contents, and settings. This is designed to allow you to efficiently administer your Files.com ecosystem, regardless of the structure of your sites, workspaces, partners and folder permissions.

Global access to child sites allows parent Site Administrators to transfer data between the parent site and any of its child sites, or between different child sites.

In addition, automations in a parent site that are owned by parent Site Administrators can affect child sites.

Parent Site Administrators can also open sessions to any child site, allowing them to connect to that site and interact with it directly.

Although parent Site Administrators can interact with the files on Child Sites, the history of those activities is only recorded in logs for the site the user is connected to. For parent site Automations working with child site through the underscore folder, the history is logged in the parent site's logs.

Transferring Data Between Parent and Child Sites

Parent Site Administrators can choose a child site folder as the destination to move or copy files to in the File Manager. If they are copying or moving from a child site's folder in the underscore folder, they can copy between different child sites.

Users logged directly into a child site cannot move or copy files to the parent site, or to any other child sites.

Automations with Child Sites

Parent Site Administrators use the underscore folder to create automations that interact directly with child sites. Each parent site automation that moves or copies can use child site folders as the source, destination or both. Automations on a parent site can create folders or delete files from folders on the parent site or any child sites.

Every automation belongs to only 1 site, and it can only be managed through its site. Even when a parent site automation uses a child site for source or destination folders, the automation and its run logs exist within the parent site.

This isolation of automations within their sites affects how file action-based triggers can be used. File action triggers start automations when specific file events happen inside Files.com folders. Only actions recorded within the automation's site can trigger an automation. This means that parent site automations triggered by file activity within a child site's folder are only triggered when the activity's user is connected to a parent site. That parent site automation cannot be triggered by file activity carried out directly in the child site.

Automations in child sites have no way to interact with parent sites or any other child sites. This means that a child site automation with a file action trigger is not started when file activity occurs within a parent site process or session, even if that file activity is changing the contents of the child site.

Granting Access to Child Sites

Parent Site Administrators can grant other parent site users or groups permissions to any paths within a child site, with all of the permissions options.

Child Site users cannot be granted folder permissions for folders in the parent site.

Parent Site Administrators also have the option of designating other parent site users as Site Administrators or Read-only administrators of each child site.

Switching Web Sessions

Parent site users who are granted access to child sites will see a menu icon next to the logo of their web interface. This menu grants access to any sites the logged-in user can access. This allows a user with access to multiple child sites to seamlessly switch between their different sites.

History Logging

File actions that impact a child site could happen within the parent site (through the underscore folder) or on the child site. To keep things simple, each action is logged in only the site where the user or process is authenticated.

For parent Site Administrators and Automations, that means using the underscore folder to access child sites. Other access by parent site users occurs through the child site.

Actions in Underscore Folder on Parent Sites

When parent site administrators interact with the contents of a child site using the underscore folder, those changes are only captured in the parent site's logs, and they are not logged within the child site.

Notifications or automations in the child site cannot be triggered by file actions taken through the underscore folder on the parent site because those actions occur within the context of the parent site.

Actions in Child Site by Parent Site Users

When a parent site user connects to a child site, any actions they perform within the site are captured in the child site's logs only.

Automations configured on the underscore folder in the parent site cannot be triggered by file actions taken within a child site.

Direct Site Access

User accounts created directly within a child site interact with the child site by authenticating directly with that site.

Child site users are permitted to access the site through all of the interfaces that have been enabled for them.

Using API Keys with Child Sites

API Keys are linked to exactly 1 site. It doesn’t matter if the key is for the whole site or for 1 user - it only works with the site it was made for. If an API key was made for a parent site, it can only be used with that parent site. If it was made for a child site, it only works with that child site.

Site Alert Emails for Child Sites

Files.com sends emails to site administrators when there is trouble with their site. The email will indicate which site an alert belongs to, if it is generated for a child site.