Add permission topic to the documentation

docs/index.rst

@@ -17,14 +17,12 @@ Mayan EDMS documentation
 .. _indexing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_card
 .. _Open source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source
 
-Links of interest
-=================
+On the Web
+=====================
 
 * Website: http://www.mayan-edms.com
 * Source: http://github.com/rosarior/mayan
-* Video: http://bit.ly/pADNXv
-* Issue tracker: http://github.com/rosarior/mayan/issues
-* Mailing list: http://groups.google.com/group/mayan-edms 
+* Video: http://bit.ly/Mayan-Intro
 
 
 First steps
@@ -39,12 +37,13 @@ First steps
 Understanding Mayan EDMS
 ========================
 
-  :doc:`Transformations <topics/transformations>` |
   :doc:`Indexes <topics/indexes>` |
   :doc:`Smart links <topics/smart_links>` |
+  :doc:`Permission system <topics/permissions>` |
   :doc:`Document visualization <topics/document_visualization>` |
   :doc:`OCR <topics/ocr>` |
   :doc:`File storage <topics/file_storage>`
+  :doc:`Transformations <topics/transformations>`
 
 
 Between versions

docs/topics/permissions.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
+===========
+Permissions
+===========
+
+**Mayan EDMS** provides very exact control over what activies users can 
+perform.  This control is divided into two levels of operation:
+
+* 2-tier permission assignment - This level of activity control works
+  by allowing roles that are composed of users and group, to be granted
+  a permission such that the holder of that permission can exercise it
+  throught the entire collection of objects (document, folders, tags, etc),
+  this method could be thought out as a global permission granting level.
+  Example: Roles being granted the ``Document view`` permission will be able to view
+  **all** documents in existance.
+  
+* 3-tier access control - When more control is desired over which objects
+  actors(user, groups and roles) can exercise an action this method should be
+  used.  Under this level, actors are granted a
+  permission but only in relation to a selected object.  Example: Granting user
+  ``Joe`` the ``Document view`` access control for document ``Payroll``,
+  would allow him to view this document only.
+  
+The permission system enforces inheritance by first checking if the user
+has a global permission, is a member of a group or a role that has a global
+permission and if not then checks to see if that user, a group or role to
+which he belongs, has been granted access to the specific object to which
+he is desiring to perform a given action that requires a permission.
+Only when these checks fails the user
+is forbidden to perform the action and a generic message indicating this is
+displayed to avoid providing any information that could be used to sidetrack
+the permission system or obtain any kind of information about the object
+from which the user was not allowed access.