After you’ve installed the Information Rights Management client, here’s the screen you will see if you click the Permissions button () on the standard toolbar:

 

 

The first checkbox, Restrict permission to this document, must be checked for the rest of the options in the dialog box to become available.

 

In the first box, you can enter the e-mail addresses of people you want to have read permission for the document. With this permission level, they cannot change, print, or copy any part of the document.

 

The next level is Change. Users with this permission level can read the document, edit it, and save it, but they cannot print it.

 

You can also click the Read or Change buttons to select addresses from your Outlook address book, or click the Check Names button () to check the e-mail addresses you have entered against your Outlook address book.

 

Once again, we have a Learn more about permissions link, which will open up the Word help topics for Information Rights Management.

 

You can also click the More Options… button to set advanced permission levels.

 

 

Like the main permissions dialog, you can add or remove users using the buttons to the right of the user list. You can also modify their access level by clicking that field next to each user:

 

 

The next set of options lets you set an expiry date, allow printing, allow copying, and allow people to access the content of the document programmatically.

 

The third set of options gives users an e-mail address they can e-mail if they want additional permissions. This is also where you can set backward compatibility, so that users with earlier versions of Office can view Information Rights Management protected documents in browsers supporting the feature. The last option is for users on a network supporting Information Rights Management; this will require Word to connect to the server to verify the user’s permissions.

 

You can also click the Set Defaults button to make these options the default for all Information Rights Management protected documents.

 

A third way to set permissions is to use the File menu.

 

 

If you’re the owner of the document, by default Unrestricted Access is checked. (This will also appear for users that have full control over the document.) Clicking Do Not Distribute will open the same permissions dialog box that we saw when we clicked the permissions icon on the standard toolbar. Last but not least, you can click the Restrict Permission As… command to change which .NET passport you use to set permissions on your document.