Documents and spaces
Documents and the three-space model
What are docivault’s three document spaces?
The problem
A folder with permissions cannot tell you whether a document is ready to be seen
One folder, one permission list
A shared drive folder gives everyone in it the same view. Loosening it for one person loosens it for all of them; there is no middle ground between "in" and "out".
A draft becomes visible by accident
Move a working file into the wrong folder, or forget it was ever shared, and the contact sees something that was never meant for them yet.
No answer to "is this ready?"
Whether a document is fit for the other side to see is a judgement call someone has to remember to make, every single time, with no structure enforcing it.
Three spaces
One question, answered in one click, instead of an audit
Each contact gets all three. A document lives in exactly one until you move it.
Private
The person who uploaded it and your admins only. For drafts, internal notes and anything not yet fit for the wider team or the contact to see.
Team
Your admins and the team members assigned to that contact, never the contact. For work in progress that colleagues need, but that the contact should not see yet.
Shared
What the contact’s own portal users can see, together with the assigned team. Nothing lands here until someone deliberately moves it in.
Categories
A label that cuts across all three spaces
Categories
Available nowLabel documents so both sides find them later. Start from a template set or build your own.
Not built yet
What this page does not promise
Opens by contacts, team members and share-link visitors are recorded, and for every share link its creator and your admins can see who opened it and when. A workspace-wide way to browse or export those records is still to come.
Full audit trail
Coming soonDocument opens by contacts, team members and share-link visitors are recorded, but cannot yet be viewed or exported in the product. A way to browse and export them, and a complete, tamper-proof audit trail, are still to be built.
Questions
What people ask about documents and spaces
What are docivault’s three document spaces?
Private, Team and Shared. Private is the person who uploaded it and your admins only. Team is your admins and the team members assigned to that contact, never the contact. Shared is what the contact’s own portal users can see, along with the assigned team. A document sits in one space at a time, and moving it between spaces is a deliberate action rather than a permissions change.
Why three spaces instead of folders with permissions?
A permissions list answers "who can technically open this". A space answers "is this ready for them to see" — which is the question that actually matters day to day, and it gets a one-click answer instead of an audit of who is in which folder.
Is the documents feature built yet?
Yes. The three spaces, uploading a document into one of them, and moving a document between them are all built and available now. Viewing is built too: PDFs, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files and images are converted on docivault’s own servers and shown page by page as plain images. Video is not supported. Admins can download a document and decide, per document, whether team members, contacts or named people can too; every download is logged, and share-link visitors can never download. Screenshots cannot be prevented by any web product.
What can I do with documents in docivault today?
Upload a document into a contact’s Private, Team or Shared space, move it between those spaces, label it with a category, view most common formats page by page, comment on it, and share it as a link that expires. What is not built is importing in bulk from Drive or OneDrive, and a way to browse or export the record of who opened a document.
Put your first document somewhere it belongs
Workspaces, contacts, the three spaces, upload, preview, admin-controlled download and categories are all built today. You can add a contact and move a document into their Shared space in the next few minutes.
- No credit card
- Free plan, no expiry
- The people you exchange with are free