A partner channel covers one Partner. When many Partners get the same exchange, configuring each channel by hand means repeating the same settings for every Partner and re-doing that work every time the exchange changes. Partner Channel Templates apply one channel configuration across many Partners and keep it applied.

A Template carries the reusable channel settings. Those are the channel Folder Path, the To Partner and From Partner folder names, the Managed Folder Paths for each direction, and optional route path patterns. In a route path pattern, {{partner_name}} expands to the Partner's name, so each Partner's channel routes to its own target folder from the same pattern.

Site Administrators and Workspace Administrators manage Templates. You can create as many Templates as your exchanges need, and each Partner can be assigned only one. Assign a Template to a Partner using the Partner's Partner Channel Template option. Assigning it creates or updates that Partner's Template-owned partner channel, and editing the Template pushes the change to every assigned Partner's channel.

A Template change validates every assigned Partner first. When any Partner's channel cannot be updated cleanly, the change fails and names the blocking Partner and folder path, so it never lands on some Partners and not others. Files.com never deletes folders or files to make a Template change apply.

A Template-owned partner channel cannot be edited or deleted directly. Its configuration comes from the Template, which is what keeps every assigned Partner's channel identical. To change one, change the Template.

Removing and Deleting Templates

Removing a Template from a Partner disconnects the Template and leaves an identical partner channel in place. The leftover channel is no longer Template-owned, and it acts as if it had been created manually for that Partner, so you can edit or delete it directly from then on.

Deleting a Template deletes the Template itself and disconnects every Partner that had it assigned. Each of those Partners keeps an identical, now-disconnected partner channel, so their exchanges keep working without the Template.

To fully remove a Template's effects, delete the Template, then delete each Partner's leftover channel. Deleting a Partner Channel removes the inferred permissions and routing while leaving the folders and files intact, so as the final step, delete the remaining folders and files manually, and only once you have confirmed the data is no longer needed.

Assigning a Template Where Folders Already Exist

The same match-first approach from Adding Managed Folders to Existing Folders applies to Templates. Before assigning a Template to a Partner whose exchange folders already exist, bring that Partner's structure in line with the Template's configuration, clear stray content from managed levels, and remove the hand-built folder permissions and Lock Subfolders folder settings that block the assignment. Then assign the Template, and Files.com adopts the matching folders into the Template-owned channel.