Share Preview Link

Citizen Space has the functionality for you to share a preview link of the activity with someone who is not a Citizen Space administrator or with colleagues in different departments or teams. You may need to do this for approval or review, for example with a manager or policy owner who does not have access to Citizen Space.

How to share a preview

1. Navigate to the dashboard of your activity.

2. Click the link titled 'Share Preview Link' (right hand side of the screen):

Top of Dashboard with Share Preview Link highlighted.

If you have not yet created a preview link, you will be presented with this page to set the link expiration period.

The share preview link dropdown with the expiry time options. Screenshot.

3. Choose how long you would like the preview link to remain active for. Your options are: 24 Hours, 3 Days, 1 Week (7 days), 2 weeks, 3 weeks and 4 weeks. Click 'Create Preview Link'.

4. Your preview link will now be created for you and you will be presented with a page giving you your options for sharing it. 

Generated preview link with expiration date and with options to share including copy and paste or send by email. Screenshot.

5. Choose one of the options and share away. Clicking on 'Send Preview Link by Email' should open up your email client with the preview link as the body of the email, and a subject line of 'Preview URL for [name of your activity].'

Note: Anyone who receives this preview link will be able to preview the whole activity as it will appear to respondents, including any online survey questions and supporting documentation.  Make sure any recipients of this link are aware of this and are careful not to forward it or accidentally include it in 'reply-to-all' messages and so on.

If a preview link has accidentally been shared with someone who shouldn't see it, please refer to the Troubleshooting section at the end of this document.

Troubleshooting / FAQs

Should I use 'Share Preview' or the normal 'Preview Activity' option on the dashboard?

If everyone who needs to preview and sign off the activity already has a Citizen Space account, and has permission to preview the activity, then we recommend that you continue to use the 'Preview Activity' link.  This method is preferable as it does not have an expiry date, can be done at any time, and doesn't have the overhead of telling everyone the temporary address.

The following users can always preview activities via the dashboard, without needing to use a time-limited preview link:

  • Site admins
  • Department admins in the same department as the activity
  • Individual admins in the same department as the activity
  • Analysts assigned to the activity

My preview link is about to expire but my activity is not signed off yet. Can I extend the time limit?

Yes you can. The expiry date and time of the preview link is shown underneath the sharing options on the Share Preview page.

To extend the expiry date of the preview:

  1. Follow steps 1 and 2 from the instructions for sharing the preview.
  2. You will be presented with the page from step 4.
  3. Click the 'Change Expiry Date' link.
  4. You will be presented with a drop down list to select how much longer you would like the link to be valid for.
  5. Select your option from the list. The new expiry date will be calculated based on the date and time that you updated it, not added to the end of the original expiry date.

The preview link has accidentally been shared with someone who shouldn't have access to it!

Since the preview link allows anyone who receives the link to preview the activity, if it accidentally gets to the wrong person you may wish to prevent them from accessing the preview - for example, this could happen if the link gets included in a long email chain. If this happens you can delete the preview link:

  1. Follow steps 1 and 2 from the instructions for sharing the preview.
  2. You will be presented with the page from step 4.
  3. Select the 'Delete Preview Link' link.
  4. You will be presented with a dialog box asking you to confirm that you want to delete the link.
  5. Selecting 'OK' on the dialog will delete the preview link, and it will stop working for anyone who has received it
  6. If you still need to share the preview with people, you will need to create a new preview link. Follow the instructions for how to share a preview above. This will create a brand new preview link for you to share again. The old link will be permanently deleted.

The Preview Link has been shared with someone by accident. Can I just stop them seeing it, without having to share a new Preview Link with everyone else?

No - the Preview Link is the same for everybody who it is sent to, so deleting it for one deletes it for all.