To use Odoo you must have a user account. This will normally be setup by the “admin” user, but other users can do this if they have the correct access.

To get started, navigate to Settings / Users & Companies / Users

Note: several actions are available, including duplicating user profiles (which is recommended if you need to create a new user with the same or similar access). These are described below

We will use “Marc Demo” from the Odoo demo data as an example.

1. Smart Buttons
2. [Multicompany only] Allocate user to one or more companies.
3. Select user type: Internal, Portal or Public
4. [Internal User only] Grant access to applications
5. [Internal User only] Technical Settings
6. [Internal User only] Other access
7. Preferences

1. Smart Buttons

In Odoo 13 there are a series of “smart buttons” at the top of the Form View. They summarize the user’s access (more information here) and can be useful in troubleshooting, but it’s better to start by reviewing the setup as shown below.

2. Companies

In a multi-company database, select the companies that will be available for this user.

3. User Type

Users must be allocated to one of the three types:

1. Internal users can have full access to Odoo applications
2. Portal users could be customers or suppliers (with access to view relevant documents only – customers can see their own orders)
3. Public users can only access the website

Note: in earlier versions of Odoo it was possible to be allocated to more than one of the types.

More information on User Types

For Internal Users there are more options to select, as shown below.

4. Applications

For each application that is installed there will be a few (usually two or three) different access groups to choose from. In the example shown above, the user has the lowest level of access for sales and the middle level for Accounting (Advisor is the highest).

These are the options for the Sales Application:

1. Sales / User: Own Documents Only
2. Sales / User: All Documents
3. Sales Administrators (Managers)

The lowest level is Sales / User: Own Documents Only. It’s important to understand that the next level (All Documents) “inherits” ALL the rights of the lowest level and has additional rights.

By the same logic, the Administrator “inherits” ALL the rights of the other two levels and has additional rights.

More information on Application Access Groups

5. Technical Settings

These are displayed in Developer Mode

Each of these settings activates a feature or functionality within Odoo. For example:

• “Manage Product Variants” allows users to create and modify variants (e.g. colors and sizes) by granting access to some menus. You might want to limit this to selected users.
• “Manage Multiple Stock Locations” is used in Inventory and related apps.
• “Analytic Accounting” is a useful feature that needs to be enabled first and then users need to be authorized.
• “Addresses in Sales Orders” allow users to select customer invoice and delivery addresses on sales orders.

More details here

6. Other access

The three ‘Extra Rights’ should be fairly self-explanatory.

Care needs to be taken when enabling ‘Access to Private Addresses’ because it may have unexpected results. More information here

7. Preferences

Home Action is the initial view shown for a user. Select a Windows Actions from the list, as show below. This can be confusing because there may be several with the same name, as in this example:

This is the first “Leads” view from the list:

If this is not what you want, try the next one in the list!

Actions

When you are viewing a user profile, several options are available from the “Action” dropdown.

• Archive (standard)
• Delete (standard)
• Duplicate (see below)
• Change Password (see below)
• Assigned Tasks

Duplicate

This is a useful option if you have already setup one user and want to copy the setup.

Password

After setting up a new user, you can set a password by selecting the “Change Password” option. You can also “Send an invitation Email” (for a new user) or “Send password reset instructions” (for an existing user). Both of these will allow the user to reset their password.

Note that a similar list of actions is available from the List View

• Export
• Archive
• Unarchive
• Delete
• Change Password