Resource types
Define the kinds of things your organization manages — spaces, people, tools, and any type you add yourself.
Settings → Resource Types — “The kinds of things your organization manages. Spaces, people, and tools are built in; add your own — cars, cameras, anything…” Everything here needs the Editor role or above.
Built-in and custom types
Space, Person, and Tool are seeded in every organization and carry a Built-in badge: they cannot be edited or removed, so the edit and remove buttons appear only on the types you define yourself. Spaces and People also keep their own purpose-built pages (Spaces and floorplans, People and teams).
Everything else is yours to define — and each type you add gets its own sidebar entry and its own resource page.
Creating a type
Add Resource Type:
- Name — the singular display name, e.g. Car. It labels one resource: the Edit Car row action, and the type’s slot on a request.
- Plural name — e.g. Cars. It labels a list of them: the sidebar entry, the utilization tab, the page title. “Used wherever a list of them is named — the sidebar, the utilization tab, the page title.” It is pre-filled from the name as you type and can be corrected — which is the point, since not every plural is the name plus an s, in English or otherwise.
- Key — derived from the name, e.g.
car. “Lowercase letters, numbers, and underscores; must start with a letter.” Once the type exists the key is fixed: “The key identifies this type in links and stored data, so it cannot be changed.” - Icon — pick from the icon set; “Shown in the sidebar and resource lists. Leave unset to use the default”.
- Description — shown on the type’s page and on its resource dialog.
Under What these can do, three checkboxes decide how resources of the type behave. They are the difference between a type that is merely named and one the product treats like a built-in:
- Can be placed on a floorplan — “Adds a code, a capacity and a drawable shape. Its site owns it and it cannot travel.” This is what makes a type behave like Spaces.
- Has directory details — “Adds an email, job title and department, and can be linked to a user account.” This is what makes a type behave like People.
- Belongs to one group at a time — “Adding it to a second group moves it, rather than listing it in both.”
The new type appears in the sidebar immediately.
Built-in types
Spaces, People and Tools can be renamed, re-iconed and re-described — call them Rooms, Staff and Equipment if that is your vocabulary. Their behaviour cannot be changed and they cannot be removed: the Spaces and People pages are built on it, so switching it off would break a page you have no way to repair. The dialog says as much and disables those boxes.
Describing resources of a type
Attributes are not defined per type here — they are
criteria, and a criterion’s Applies to setting lists
every active resource type, including the ones you defined. Give Car a numeric Mileage
criterion or a Next inspection date criterion and it works everywhere criteria work: as a
capability on your cars, on their groups, and in conflict messages. One vocabulary, not two.
Removing a type
Remove is protective: “If resources of this type already exist, the type is deactivated instead of deleted so those resources keep working.” A deactivated type is marked Inactive here and drops out of the sidebar, the criteria applicability picker, and the Insights utilization charts — its resources are left untouched. A type with no resources is deleted outright.