Info: This article is work in progress and subject to change.
Every component on a Workflow Assistant panel — Field, Action, Notification, or Widget — has a visibility checklist that decides which asset kinds it appears for. This article is the reference treatment of the visibility checklist: the rules, the patterns, and the diagnostic questions to ask when a component does not appear when you expect it to.
For the conceptual introduction, see 02c — Asset kinds and visibility. Read the concepts page first if you have not already; this article assumes you know the terminology.
The rule, stated precisely
The Workflow Assistant evaluates a component’s visibility in this order:
- Look at the asset kinds present in the user’s current selection
- Compare them with the Applies to checklist on the component
- If at least one asset in the selection has a kind that is ticked on the checklist, the component is visible
- If the user has selected nothing and the component has No asset ticked, the component is visible
- Otherwise, the component is hidden
Three properties of this rule worth keeping in mind:
| Property | Explanation |
|---|---|
| Permissive across kinds | A multi-asset selection that includes one matching kind makes the component visible — even if the other selected assets do not match |
| Independent of conditions | The visibility checklist runs before any Lucene Disable, Required, or Display condition. A component can be hidden by the checklist but still have a passing condition; it stays hidden |
| No defaults change at runtime | The checklist is set at panel-design time. Users cannot override it — only the checklist values stored in the configuration matter |
Note: “Permissive across kinds” is the single most surprising part of the rule. Selecting a video plus an image makes any component that ticks either Video or Image appear. To restrict a component to selections that are exclusively one kind, combine the checklist with a Lucene Disable condition that compares against assetDomain.
The available kinds
The checklist offers the same eleven asset kinds plus the special No asset option on every component:
| Kind | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Image | JPEG, PNG, TIFF, RAW, and similar |
| Video | MP4, MOV, AVI, MXF, and similar |
| Audio | WAV, MP3, AIFF, FLAC, and similar |
| Document | Word documents, Pages files, plain-text documents |
| Presentation | PowerPoint, Keynote, similar |
| PDF files | |
| Text | Plain-text and source-code files |
| XML | XML files |
| Generic | Anything that does not fit a named kind |
| Archive | Zip and similar archives |
| Container | A Collection in Assets |
| No asset | The user has selected nothing |
The list is fixed by Assets. You cannot define a new kind. To distinguish further inside a kind — “marketing photographs” versus “product photographs,” say — use a metadata field and a Disable condition.
Practical patterns
Six patterns recur on every panel. Use them as templates.
| Pattern | When to use it | Checklist setting |
|---|---|---|
| All assets, all the time | A field that should appear for every selection, including no selection | Click Select all — every kind plus No asset ticked |
| Single-kind field | A field that only makes sense for one kind (e.g. Duration on Video) | Click Clear, then tick the single kind. Leave No asset unticked |
| Media-only field | A field that applies to images, video, and audio together | Tick Image, Video, Audio. Leave the rest unticked |
| No-selection guidance | An onboarding Notification that orients the user before they have selected anything | Click Clear, then tick No asset. Optionally also tick the kinds the panel applies to so the message stays visible after selection |
| Always-on navigation button | A button that takes the user somewhere, regardless of selection | Always on turned on, plus the visibility checklist set to Select all |
| Container-only widget | A widget that operates on Collections only | Tick Container, untick everything else |
Tip: The fastest way to set a tight visibility list is Select all followed by unticking the exceptions. Two clicks saves you from forgetting one of the kinds you wanted to include.
Diagnostic: why is my component not appearing?
When a component does not appear when you expect it to, work through the questions below in order.
Question 1. Is the user signed in to Assets and able to see the Workflow Assistant panel at all? If not, the issue is the Required role on the user, not the visibility checklist. Section 03a (Sign in to the Configurator) and the support manual cover role provisioning.
Question 2. Is the tab the component is in visible to the user’s group? Tab visibility uses the audience setting (groupMapping), not the asset-kind checklist. See 08 — Tabs and audience targeting.
Question 3. Does the user have an asset selected? If not, does the component have No asset ticked? If the user has nothing selected and No asset is unticked, the component is hidden by design.
Question 4. What kinds are in the user’s selection? Open Assets, look at the selected assets’ types, and confirm which kinds are present.
Question 5. Does the Applies to checklist tick at least one of those kinds? If not, the checklist is the problem. Tick the relevant kinds.
Question 6. Is there a separate condition (Disable condition, Display condition, Required condition) that is hiding or disabling the component? Check the conditions next — see 06b and 06c.
Question 7. Has the configuration been saved? Unsaved changes do not reach end users. Check the saved-state indicator.
Most “missing component” questions are answered by Question 5 — the checklist excludes the user’s kind, often because the panel was tested against an Image asset and the user is selecting something else.
When to use the checklist versus a Lucene condition
The checklist and Lucene conditions are complementary tools. Use each for what it is good at:
| Use the checklist for | Use a Lucene condition for |
|---|---|
| Differences by kind of asset (image vs video vs collection) | Differences by value of metadata (status, region, owner, custom fields) |
| Permissive show/hide based on the kinds present in a multi-selection | Strict logic that depends on what the metadata values actually are |
| The simple case where the user just needs the component for some kinds and not others | The complex case where show / hide depends on a relationship between several metadata fields |
Trying to use Lucene to do what the checklist does works, but it is more complex than necessary and harder to read. Trying to use the checklist to do what Lucene does is impossible — the checklist cannot read metadata values.
Cross-references
- 02c — Asset kinds and visibility — the conceptual introduction
- 02d — How conditions work — the Lucene primer for the value-based filtering not covered here
- 06b — Disabling components and writing disable conditions — the value-based equivalent of the checklist
- 08 — Tabs and audience targeting — for visibility decisions at the tab level
- 05c — Notifications reference — for the patterns that pair the checklist with a display condition
Revisions
- 8 May 2026: First publication of the manual
Comments
0 comments