Free Tool to Analyze Permissions and Get a Permissions Report in SharePoint 2010/2013

A client of mine was looking for a tool to get a permissions report that could be used to view the current permissions on an old SharePoint 2010 Site Collection so that we can use the report to reconfigure the permissions on a new SharePoint 2010 Site Collection. I used a few PowerShell scripts but wasn’t quite happy with the results, even though I was able to send the results to a Comma Separate Value (CSV) file that could be nicely formatted in Excel. Of course, there are some third-party tools that could be purchased but my client would not have been interested in spending money for something like this.

I went to the Open Source Web site CodePlex and fortunately found exactly what I was looking for. A wonderful tool that is simple to install, does everything I wanted from it, can even be installed on a client workstation and gives me output in a nice colorful GUI that can be saved and reloaded at another time. Basically, I struck gold!

The tool is called SharePoint Permission Analyzer, a.k.a. Permission Reporting. I have tested the tools on the following servers and operating systems:

1. SharePoint Server 2013
2. SharePoint Server 2010
3. Windows Server 2012 R2
4. Windows Server 2008 R2
5. Windows 8.1
6. Windows 7

After you install the tool you simply enter the URL and as long as you have appropriate permissions to the Site Collection (e.g. Site Collection Administrator) you are good to go. The tool is very intuitive and easy to use. Keep in mind this is a reporting tool, not a permissions managing tool. You can view the information, save the report, load a report but you can’t modify permissions.

1. Once you start the application, you simply need to provide a URL and click Go, as shown below.
2. You can expand a list or library and on the Details tab in the middle pane you will see the Groups and Users. You can expand a group to see its membership and in the right hand pane you can see what kind of permissions the group has been given.
   
3. Right-click a node and load permissions for that node.
   
4. You can also load first level or all the items in a node. This will allow you to drill down to see unique permissions on individual items in a list or library.
   
5. To save the report, right-click on any node and save the report, or on the File menu click Save Report. As you can see once you have saved a report you have the option to Load Report. This is a great tool to document your permissions so in case they get messed up you can use the report to review the permissions and then go to SharePoint site and fix them. I was working on a project for a client and their new SharePoint Administrator accidentally removed all the permissions on a top-level Site Collection. There was no documentation or report to rely on. This tool would have been perfect if there was already a saved report that could have been loaded to review the permissions.
   

I have used a lot of tools over the years and you will find reviews on my blog for some of the permissions-related tool but I must say, this is one of the nicest tools of its kind. Thanks to its author Anuj Pant who made this tool available on CodePlex.

Article Updated: June 8, 2021

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