An administrator manages the permissions accorded to users and user groups so as to realise the objectives of:

• security, by keeping people out of areas which do not concern them
• usability, by presenting only what is needed for a given user to manage their tasks
• manageability, by ensuring that roles are consistent with the work flows required.

In most sites, the role extends to overall management of the site, including management of work flows.

TYPO3 has excellent support for permissions for both font- and back-end users, which can apply down to a single content element. Thus, in an extreme case, a given user might log into the backend and see only the text area they are responsible for maintaining, and only be allowed to modify, but not publish, the existing text.