Annecy said:

- Can role scoper define uniform user roles across all sites in the network?

I'm not sure what you mean by uniform user roles across all sites (see below), as each site will have different posts and categories/terms. If you mean assigning a user the same WordPress role for all sites, then no, Role Scoper does not currently handle that.

For example, one user may have defined access to specified pages on all sites in the network (most will be read-only, or "subscriber").

I don't know what "specified pages on all sites in the network" means, since a page and its ID are inherently site-specific. What mechanism do you have in mind to mirror/expose the same pages across multiple sites?

Another user may only have access to specified pages on one of the sites, and no access to content on other sites in the network.

Yes, this is where the site-specific role assignments come into play.

- I read elsewhere that role scoper is blog-specific, so if I have to install the plug-in on each individual site within my network, can I still assign user-specific access to pages using the same network-wide user credentials?

You just have to do a "Network Activate" to install it for every site. Yes, network-wide user credentials are still recognized.

Any other considerations I'm not taking into account here?

No glaring issues come to mind, but I think that's more of a question for a professional consultation.

- Will role scoper allow me to show/hide navigation elements where appropriate to match viewing user's defined access level?

If you mean front-end page and category listings, yes, that is automatic for most WP installations.

If you mean the wp-admin menus, you can limit the display of Role Scoper's own Restrictions and Roles menus via the following option:   Roles > Options > Features tab > Content Maintenance > "Roles and Restrictions can be set"

To limit access to other wp-admin navigation menus, try the Adminimize plugin.

- Is it possible to create "groups" with user access that can be easily replicated for new users and new content areas? For example, a group called "Read Tier 4″ can be used for all users who have a certain access case, without re-configuring the group again and again each time new content is created.

Role Scoper supports site-wide groups, though you will need to assign the group roles individually for each site. If by "new content areas" you mean categories or posts within an existing site, then yes, propagating / default roles can be defined.

In short, I need a solution that is easy to implement on a site-by-site basis and easy to scale up as user volume increases.

I have not had any usability or performance issues reported with MU / Multisite. If you encounter some and can describe them to me in detail, I will be glad to consider improvements.

Anything else I'm not considering? Or other plug-ins to complement role scoper?

I'm aware of several successful MU / Multisite implementations, and am available to (a) field specific bug reports / RS usage questions here as time allows, and/or (b) assist in your site configuration (extending, debugging or customizing Role Scoper or other plugin code if needed) at a rate of $60 / hour.

dhany said:

I have a Multisite network setup with… two custom groups (not WP default); Group1 and Group2. The group applies network-wide, while the users are assigned to only 3-5 sub-sites…

What I try to achieve is; Group1 can create posts to ALL categories, while Group2 can create posts only to some categories (more restricted than Group1, set by RS plugin), in their designated sub-sites.

Should I Network Activate the plugin and set the limits one by one in every sub-site, or just Activate it in the main site and set them up once is enough to achive this?

Thank you

You will need to assign the roles separately for each site even though the groups are defined network-wide.