Versions, drafts and conflicts

Every Orbit Folio page has a published version that readers see and, for each author, a private draft. This page is for anyone who writes or reviews pages. It explains drafts, versions, comparing and restoring, conflicts and the activity log.

Drafts

Your edits are autosaved as a draft, separate from the published page. Readers keep seeing the published version until someone publishes.

A draft is kept per author. Two people editing the same page each have their own draft.
Before you start editing, Folio checks for other editors and for other people’s drafts. If it finds any, it warns you and lets you choose Edit anyway or Cancel.
Some changes publish a new version without the editor, such as ticking a check-list item or inserting a work item key with Create issue. They do not delete your draft. Your draft stays and is then out of date.

Publish a version

Edit the page. The draft saves by itself.
Publish the page and, if you like, add a short note that says what changed.
Folio creates a new version with your name, the time and the note.

What a version holds

A version is immutable: once published, its content cannot be edited.

Part	What it records
Author	The person who published
Time	When the version was published
Note	The optional comment on the change
Content	The page text, including its `properties` block

Changing the labels of a page does not create a version. It is recorded in the activity log instead.

Some versions get a note automatically:

Note	When
`Imported from <zip>`	A Markdown import created the page. See Import and export.
`Synced from <repository>/<folder> on <branch> at <commit>`	A Forge sync changed the title or text. See Sync documentation from a Forge repository.

Compare two versions

Every page has a list of its versions. Pick any two and Folio shows a line-by-line comparison, with added text and removed text highlighted. The two versions do not need to be neighbours.

Restore an old version

Restoring an old version creates a new version with the old text. The history is not rewritten, so you can always see what the page looked like before the restore.

Conflicts

When you publish, Folio knows which version you started from. If someone else published in the meantime, you do not overwrite their work. Folio shows a conflict with both versions, and you decide what the page should say.

This also holds when two people publish from the same starting version: the second one sees the conflict.

Activity log

Each space and each page has an activity log. Every entry names the person who did it and the time.

Recorded	Examples
Page changes	Creation, moves, publications, deletions
Permission changes	Who can see or edit a page, see Permissions, restrictions and public links
Metadata	Label changes, creating, editing and deleting a space template
Bulk actions	Markdown and Confluence imports, Forge syncs, with counts

The log follows page permissions. A reader who cannot see a page does not see it in the log either.

Trash

Deleting a page moves its whole subtree to the trash. Restoring puts the pages back where they were. Only space administrators can delete permanently, which also removes the files of those pages.

Pages managed by Forge

A page that comes from a Forge sync cannot be edited or published in Folio. Saving a draft, publishing, restoring a version, moving and deleting are all refused. Comments, reactions, labels and watching still work. To change such a page, use Propose a change, which opens a merge request.