The new online archive provides a simple, secure, and cost-efficient solution for long-term project data access. By eliminating the need for USB deliveries, it ensures all authorized parties can access the information even after a project ends, while meeting compliance requirements and keeping your data at your fingertips whenever you need it. An online archive is a cloud-based, read-only version of your project. Once a project is archived, its index is fixed, meaning no modifications such as deleting, moving, or uploading can be made.
ℹ️ Available with Core and Premier subscriptions only
💡 Learn more about all available archiving options
Archiving project online
To access the online archive feature, go to either of these tabs in the left navigation panel:
Settings – General, navigate to the Archiving card, and click Archive project.
You can also click the project status dropdown and select Archived.
Project archiving – Online archive card, click Archive project.
In the opened page, fill out the required information to archive your project online.
Duration
Decide for how many years you want to store the project online by selecting or entering the number.
💡 The minimum duration is 3 years, and the maximum – 10. Depending on your subscription terms, you may have 5 years included as an alternative to USB drives.
Upon selecting years, you may see dynamically adjusted annual and total fees for full transparency on applicable costs according to your subscription terms. The invoice will be sent to the billing contact person specified in the subscription tab of the corporate account.
Access rights
Here, you can add existing project participants and/or invite new external users who should have access to the project archive.
To add project participants, simply find and select them in the dropdown list.
To provide access rights to users outside your project, click Invite external users at the bottom of the dropdown with existing participants.
⚠️ All participants with access rights have equal, full access to all project documents, participants, settings, activity logs, and other features.
Confirmation
Once you're done, click Archive project. In the appeared modal, additionally confirm and acknowledge fees, if any are applicable.
If your project has not been locked before archiving, then it will be temporarily locked to prepare the online archive. This ensures that the archived data remains a true and final record of the project.
⚠️ Project archiving cannot be undone. If this was done in error, reach out to your account manager or customer support for further assistance.
Once the project is archived, an email with the confirmation of archiving is sent to project administrators that were added to the online archive. Other participants get a separate invitation to the online archive.
Archived project features
Upon archiving the project, it becomes a read-only archive with limited functionality compared to a regular data room.
Dashboard
The online archive dashboard is a landing page that provides a quick overview of the following details in the top panel:
When the project was archived.
Until when the project is archived.
Confirmation of archiving: a signed document from Ideals confirming the archiving date and time.
💡 Click Project lifecycle for more details on the project’s status history and other info.
The top panel is followed by a summary overview of project documents, including storage size and breakdown by document types.
On the left side, you may find previously generated reports as of archiving time, mainly:
Participant list: a list of groups and users that were present in the project before archiving.
Permissions matrix: a detailed list of documents vs. groups and their permission level to a given document.
Q&A discussions: all submitted questions and answers. Applicable only if the Q&A section was set up in the project.
💡 A detailed activity log remains available in the online archive for reviewing historical and new events after project archiving.
On the main part of the screen, you will see a list of online archive participants with the ability to quickly add new ones.
Documents
All online archive participants can access all project documents, including unpublished ones and those deleted to the recycle bin, if there were any.
⚠️ If you don't want to reveal deleted documents, make sure the recycle bin is emptied before archiving the project. If there are any deleted documents left, the recycle bin will be present in the main navigation panel for all participants. Deletion from the recycle bin is not possible in the archived project.
Any changes to the project index are forbidden, and multiple actions with documents are not available in the online archive. You may find a summary in the table below.
Action | Availability |
View | ✔️ |
✔️ | |
Download | ✔️ |
Copy files to other active projects | ✔️ |
Add, edit, and delete notes | ✔️ |
Export project index | ✔️ |
Upload | ❌ |
Delete | ❌ |
Publish/unpublish | ❌ |
Redact/unredact, edit draft | ❌ |
Copy within the project | ❌ |
Move | ❌ |
Upload new version | ❌ |
Rename | ❌ |
Extract archive | ❌ |
Bulk rename | ❌ |
Import folder structure | ❌ |
Rebuild index | ❌ |
Add, edit, and delete labels | ❌ |
Share files externally | ❌ |
Request E-signatures | ❌ |
Participants
In the participants tab, you may find the list of all online archive participants and:
Add participants: click the button, enter emails, and click Invite.
Resend invitation: click the corresponding button inline with the participant or on the top panel after selecting one or more participants from the list.
Delete existing participants: click the corresponding button inline with the participant or on the top panel after selecting one or more participants from the list.
Reports
The reports section offers a comprehensive activity log for full transparency. This detailed log covers all project activity from its creation and continues to track all ongoing activities by current participants of the online archive. The activity log can be emailed or exported to an Excel file if needed.
Settings
In the settings menu, you can check and update the following settings:
General: review and manage your project status, copy the project link, and check the storage location of your project.
Branding: upload a logo, change theme color and login page background to reflect your company's brand.
Labels: review available document labels that were set up and used during the active project phase.
Terms of use: create terms for participants to accept before accessing your project.
Watermarks: decide when to display watermarks; edit watermarks color, opacity, position, and details included.
Security: provide support access if needed; strengthen security by enabling 2-step verification and email verification, restrict access by email domains and IP addresses.
Project archiving
For the archived project, you can still create a downloadable archive or order USB drives. Since certain functionalities are not relevant for archived projects, the archive preferences vary slightly from those available for active projects. You will have the following options:
Documents and activity log
Only documents
Selected folders
💡 If there are any Q&A attachments or documents in the recycle bin, you can opt to include them. For historical data, refer to the Dashboard – Reports section.