--- title: "PDF content ownership in Nutrient Instant" canonical_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web/instant-synchronization/permissions/content-ownership/" md_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web/instant-synchronization/permissions/content-ownership.md" last_updated: "2026-06-08T22:00:44.392Z" description: "Collaboration permissions allow you to define what actions are allowed on a piece of content in a document (annotations, Instant Comments." --- # Content ownership in Nutrient Instant Instant sync and collaboration is available when using [Web SDK](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web.md) with [Document Engine](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/document-engine.md). For more information, refer to the [operational mode](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web/about/operational-modes.md) guide. Collaboration permissions allow you to define what actions are allowed on a piece of content in a document (annotations, Instant Comments, or form fields) based on [who created it and what its group is](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/defining-permissions.md#scope). Document Engine tracks this information for all annotations, comments, and form fields in every document. This guide aims to describe both how you can manage this information via the Document Engine API and how it changes during document lifecycle. ## Creator Creator is an immutable property of every piece of content created with Document Engine. When you specify a `user_id` in the [JSON Web Token](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/document-engine/viewer/client-authentication.md) (JWT) used to authenticate Nutrient Web SDK, each annotation, comment, and form field created is attributed to that user. If the JWT claims don’t include `user_id`, the creator of all content is set to `null`. You can also pass the `user_id` parameter when creating [annotations](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Annotations/operation/create-document-annotation) and [comments](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Comments) through the Document Engine API. As with the JWT, if you don’t provide `user_id` in either of these APIs, the default of `null` will be used. To inspect which creator is assigned to each piece of content, see the `createdBy` property when fetching [annotations](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Annotations/operation/get-document-annotations) and [comments](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Comments/operation/fetch-document-annotation-comments). Note that even though it’s possible to assign and fetch the creator of [form field values](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Forms), this information isn’t useful, because you can’t specify form field permissions based on their creator. ## Group The group property was introduced to allow greater flexibility when declaring permissions and managing access to content. Unlike the creator, the group of each annotation, comment, and form field is mutable, which means it can be changed either with the Document Engine API or directly with the Web SDK. You can read more [in the group section](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/introduction-to-collaboration-permissions.md#group) of the introduction to Collaboration Permissions guide to find out more about the use of group with Nutrient Web SDK. [Form field values](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Forms) and widget annotations always inherit the group of the associated form field, and thus it’s not possible to set or update it directly via the Document Engine API. Comments, on the other hand, can have a completely different group than their [root annotation](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Comments). With the Document Engine API, similar to the `user_id`, you can specify the `group` when creating [annotations](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Annotations/operation/create-document-annotation) and [comments](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Comments). If you don’t provide the group, the default of `null` is used. You can also use the [annotation update](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Annotations/operation/update-document-annotation) API to change the group of the annotation. You can see what group is assigned to content by looking at the `group` property when fetching [annotations](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Annotations/operation/get-document-annotations), [comments](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Comments/operation/fetch-document-annotation-comments), and [form field values](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Forms). ## Creator and group in a document lifecycle Apart from APIs that directly create or modify content — like the annotation creation API — other functionality provided by Document Engine may also add and update content in the document. This is a reference for how these operations affect the ownership information of annotations, comments, and form fields: 1. When you [upload a document](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Documents), the creator and group of every piece of content is `null`. 2. [Copying a document](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Documents) copies the creator and group information from the original document. 3. [Creating a layer](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Layers/operation/create-new-layer) with a `source_layer_name` parameter copies the creator and group information from the source layer. 4. [Duplicating a page](https://www.nutrient.io/guides/document-engine/editor/page-manipulation/duplicate.md) copies the creator and group information of content on that page. 5. [Importing a document by ID](https://www.nutrient.io/api/reference/document-engine/upstream/#tag/Documents) (and optionally layer name) copies the creator and group information from that document. --- ## Related pages - [Editing user permissions](/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/changing-permissions.md) - [Defining document collaboration permissions](/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/introduction-to-collaboration-permissions.md) - [Example: Understanding Collaboration Permissions](/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/landlord-tenant-example.md) - [Setting user collaboration permissions](/guides/web/collaboration-permissions/defining-permissions.md)