# Roles

## Intro

A role is a personality that a user assumes when performing a specific set of operations. A role includes a set of rights and privileges. A user assuming a role inherits the rights and privileges associated with the role. A token that is issued to a user includes the list of roles the user can assume. When a user calls a service, that service determines how to interpret a user’s roles. A role that grants access to a list of operations or resources within one service may grant access to a completely different list when interpreted by a different service.

## Setup

Role objects are instantiated from the Identity service. For more details, see the Service docs.

## Useful object properties/methods

Property | Getter | Setter
--- | --- | ---
id | `getId()` | `setId()`
name | `getName()` | `setName()`
description | `getDescription()` | `setDescription()`

## List roles

This call lists the global roles available within a specified service.

    $roles = $service->getRoles();

    foreach ($roles as $role) {
       // ...
    }

For more information about how to use iterators, see the documentation.

## Get role

This call lists detailed information (id, name, description) for a specified role.

    $roleId = '123abc';
    $role = $service->getRole($roleId);

## Add/delete user roles

To add/remove user roles, you must first instantiate a user object:

    $roleId = '123abc';

    // add role to user
    $user->addRole($roleId);

    // remove role from user
    $user->removeRole($roleId);

## List user global roles

This call returns a list of global roles associated with a user:

    $roles = $user->getRoles();

    foreach ($roles as $role) {
       // ...
    }

For more information about how to use iterators, see the documentation.