Document and revision states

ClearVue tracks two lifecycles, not one, and confusing them is the source of most “which version am I allowed to use?” questions.

• The document is the container. It is Draft, Active or Archived.
• Each revision is a version of the content. It is Draft, Under review or Approved — and once a newer revision is approved, older ones become Superseded.

A document can be Active while its newest revision is still a Draft. That is normal, and it means exactly what it says: the document is in force, and somebody is working on the next version of it.

Document states

State	Meaning
Draft	Being set up. Not yet issued.
Active	In force and issued for use.
Archived	Retired. Nothing is deleted, and archiving is reversible.

The document detail page shows this as a three-step lifecycle bar with a gate between Draft and Active — the gate is the approval that promotes it into force.

Archiving is not deleting

Archiving retires a document without removing anything, and it can be undone. It is the correct way to take a procedure out of service while keeping the record: the procedure stops being something people work to, and the history stays available. That serves ISO 9001:2015 §7.5.3.1 a) — only information that is suitable for use is available where it is needed — together with §7.5.3.2 c) and d), control of changes and retention.

The phrase “preventing the unintended use of obsolete documents” gets quoted here a lot. Worth knowing that it is not ISO 9001:2015 wording: it is from the 2008 edition, and it survives today in AS9100D §7.5.3.2 e).

Revision states

State	Meaning
Draft	Being written. Not part of the controlled record yet.
Under review	In the approval workflow.
Approved	Signed off. This state is terminal — an approved revision is never edited.
Superseded	A later revision was approved. Retained as history.

To change an approved revision you create a new one. That is the property that makes the revision history trustworthy: nothing in the record is rewritten after the fact.

Effective is a date, not a state

There is no “Effective” state. Effectivity is a date on the document, shown in the header as Effective 8/16/2026 and in the Overview panel.

That matters more than it sounds. The date is what tells you when the document began governing work — and it can differ from the date the revision was approved. On a document approved on 8/17 with an effective date of 8/16, the two answer different questions:

• Approved — when the signatures landed.
• Effective date — when it started to apply.

The document list also has an Effective only toggle, which filters to documents currently in force.

Periodic review

A document in force can still be overdue for review. The header shows a Review overdue chip, and the detail page carries a banner:

Periodic review overdue — due 2/16/2026. The document is still in force; confirm with the owner before relying on it.

Read that carefully, because it is doing something unusually honest: an overdue review does not invalidate the document. It stays in force and stays usable. What it tells you is that nobody has confirmed recently that it is still correct. The Next review due date is in the Overview panel.

Your own review cycle can still bind you

ISO 9001:2015 does not require documents to be reviewed on a fixed cycle at all — the interval is one you set. But once your quality system states one, §9.2.1 makes conformity to your own arrangements auditable. So an overdue review does not invalidate the document, and an auditor can still raise a finding against the cycle you defined. Overdue means unconfirmed, not invalid — and it is still worth clearing.

What the revisions table records

Each revision row carries the revision number, the file, its language, its status, the change record (ISO 9001 §7.5.3) with a stated reason, the file size, who uploaded it and when, and its retention.

The change record is the field an assessor reads first. “Revision 3 — periodic review update (ISO 9001 §7.5.3). Reason: Periodic review” is a well-formed one. A revision showing Not recorded has no stated reason for the change yet.

About that clause reference

ClearVue labels this field ISO 9001 §7.5.3. Read that as the area of the standard it serves, not as a requirement it satisfies. The 2015 edition requires control of changes — §7.5.3.2 c), illustrated with “version control” — and nowhere requires you to record a reason for a revision. Neither did the 2008 edition. Recording one is good practice and it is the first thing an assessor looks at, so fill it in; just do not let anyone tell you the clause compels it.

Who can see it

The Overview panel shows Placement — for example Company-wide — and the Organization panel states the rule plainly:

Facility associations widen who can see this document; they never narrow it.

So placement sets the baseline audience, and facility associations can only add to it. You cannot use an association to hide a document from part of the organisation that its placement already covers.

ISO 9001 mapping

Clause references are to ISO 9001:2015, and they say which part of the standard a behaviour supports. Software cannot make a management system conformant — only the management system can do that.

Behaviour	Clause
Review and approval of a revision for suitability and adequacy	§7.5.2 c) Creating and updating
Version control over revisions, and retention of superseded ones	§7.5.3.2 c) and d)
Placement and facility associations controlling who can see a document	§7.5.3.2 a) — distribution, access, retrieval and use
The approved version being available and suitable for use where it is needed	§7.5.3.1 a)

Two notes on that table. §7.5.3.1 and §7.5.3.2 are untitled subdivisions of §7.5.3 Control of documented information — a title quoted for either one is somebody’s invention. And the familiar phrase “approval before issue” is 2008 wording; the 2015 edition asks for review and approval “for suitability and adequacy” without tying it to issue.