Default formats, user permissions, oh my

A suggestion:

Currently, there are two permissions for each format.

There should be another permission - that controls whether or not a user is allowed to _override_ a given format.

It's also possible that there should be another _setting_ in the admin interface, to control the default checkbox state for each format. If a format is allowed, this setting would determine whether it is on or off by default.

Then, if a user has _override_ permission for that format, they can change a checkbox. If not, the default setting is used (and the user would either be told what formats their video would end up in, or just not be shown any option there).

That way, the site admin could decide what transcoding formats they want to use for video.

Let's say, for instance:

A site owner wants the option of having video transcoded into flash low res, iphone, and large format HD.

The site owner wants regular users to be able to upload video and all the UGC video should be transcoded into flash low and iphone formats. You don't want the user to be able to turn off either or both of those, and they don't get the option of transcoding to large format HD.

But someone with "Editor" permissions would be allowed to make _certain_ in-house special videos into HD as well - but they're still not allowed to turn off the iphone or low-res formats. They'd be able to click a box on or off to make an HD version of the file.

Finally, someone with "Admin" Status might be able to turn all these formats on or off, on the fly.

Currently, to allow a video to be transcoded, you have to give the person _uploading_ it control over whether it's transcoded, and in what formats. Sometimes, all you want your end user to be allowed to do is upload a file, and _you_ want to be the one to decide what happens to it. Actually, I'm thinking this is the case almost _all_ the time.

I implemented this for our specific install. It actually did not require a lot of work.

I'd like to submit a patch, but would prefer to make sure I'm not duplicating any of your in-house efforts.

While messing about with permissions, I noticed that the code that builds the "/admin/settings/cdn2/formats' page cdn2_format_settings() specifically excludes the single thumbnail option available (320x240_thumb).

That means that only the site administrator would ever have permission to create that thumbnail.

I've been digging around, and couldn't find any place where allowing a permission for thumbnailing creates a problem with other code. Is this correct, or should I be worried about disabling it, and making the thumbnail part of the normal formats/permissions scheme?

When I made the alterations mentioned in my earlier post here, I went ahead and enabled the thumbnail settings (and thus, permissions options). So far, nothing has exploded.