Collaborating on a Rider: Invite Your Engineer or TM

TL;DR — On Techrider.live, the Rider owner can invite up to 3 collaborators by email to open, edit, save, export, and inspect history on the same Rider. This is asynchronous multi-editor collaboration: you edit and save, then your engineer or TM picks up the same Rider. Real-time simultaneous editing and live presence are on the roadmap, not shipping today.

Why collaborate on a rider at all

A tech rider is rarely built by one person who knows everything. It's a handshake:

• The band / artist knows the songs and instruments — but not how many channels the venue's console has.
• The FOH or monitor engineer knows the patch, mic choices, and phantom power — but learns those details from the band.
• The PM or tour manager owns the schedule, backline hires, and the version sent to the promoter.

Most stage-plot tools handle this by exporting a read-only PDF or link and calling it "sharing." The engineer gets a picture they can't touch, so corrections turn into a chain of emails and "can you change channel 14 to a DI?" messages. By show day, three versions float around and nobody knows which is real.

The fix: let the people who know things actually edit the same source of truth — one Rider, with a history of who changed what. For why a rider should be a living document, see Why Your Tech Rider Should Be a Living Document.

What "multi-editor collaboration" means here

Techrider.live ships asynchronous co-editing of a single Rider:

• The owner invites collaborators by email — up to 3 per Rider.
• Each collaborator can open, edit, save, export, and inspect history on that same Rider.
• Because it's asynchronous, one person edits at a time: you save, then your engineer opens the Rider and continues. No live cursor or presence indicator — by design for now.
• Edits land on one connected data source, so renumbering an input channel updates the stage plot and monitor mixes together. (See How to Build an Input List / Patch Sheet.)

What it is — and what it isn't yet

If you came looking for Google-Docs-style live co-editing, that is not what ships today — it's on the roadmap. What does ship covers the workflow most bands and engineers need: hand off the Rider, let the right person make the change, keep one canonical version.

Step-by-step: the collaboration workflow

1. The owner invites a collaborator by email

Open the Rider you own, go to the invite panel, and enter your engineer's or TM's email.

The invitee gets an email pointing to the Rider. On their first authenticated visit, the Rider appears in their account as an Editor with full edit / save / export / history access. (They sign in so each change is attributed — that powers the history view.)

2. Edit and save the same Rider

The workflow is turn-based:

1. The band fills in positions, instruments, and a first pass at the input list, then saves.
2. The engineer opens the same Rider, renumbers channels, swaps a vocal mic, marks which inputs need 48V, then saves.
3. The TM reviews, adds a backline note, then saves.

At every step there's exactly one current version of the Rider — no "v3_FINAL_really_final.pdf" lying around. The live link always points at the newest save.

3. Inspect history to see who changed what

Every save is attributed to a signed-in editor, so you can open the history view to see how the Rider evolved — useful when a channel changed the night before load-in.

. A "restore" link on each row. Neutral UI, acid-green highlight on the currently selected version.)

History turns "collaboration" into something you can trust: if a change is wrong, you can see who made it and roll it back.

4. Share a view-only link with the venue (and optionally collect feedback)

When the Rider is ready, you don't give the venue edit access — you give them a view-only link. Optionally turn on Feedback so the venue or local crew can leave comments (e.g. "we don't have a second kick mic") without touching the Rider.

This three-tier model — edit / view-only / view + feedback — matches how productions communicate. The full breakdown lives in Sharing & Collaborating on a Rider: Link, PDF, Feedback.

5. Export the PDF for the day of show

Festival networks are unreliable and some crews want paper. Export the current Rider to PDF from the editor — generated from the same data as the live link, so the two never drift. The PDF is your safety belt; the live link is your source of truth.

The value, stated plainly

Most stage-plot tools stop at a read-only link. Techrider.live lets your engineer actually edit the Rider — asynchronously, on the same version, with full history. For comparing tools by team workflows, see Best Stage Plot Software for Collaboration & Teams.

FAQ

Can multiple people edit a stage plot at the same time? Not yet. Today collaboration on Techrider.live is asynchronous: one person edits and saves, then another opens the same Rider and continues. Real-time simultaneous editing and live presence are on the roadmap. Up to 3 invited collaborators get full edit / save / export / history access on the same Rider.

How do I share a tech rider with my engineer for editing? As the owner, open the invite panel, enter your engineer's email, and add them as an Editor (up to 3 per Rider). On their first authenticated visit the Rider appears in their account with full edit access. For a venue, use the view-only link.

What is the best way to collaborate on a stage plot? Keep one canonical version everyone edits, rather than emailing copies. Give edit access only to the few who need it (band, engineer, TM), the venue a view-only link, and use history to track changes. Techrider.live is built around this asynchronous, single-source-of-truth workflow.

Can my tour manager edit my tech rider? Yes. Invite them by email as an Editor. They can open, edit, save, export, and inspect history on the same Rider you own — no separate copy, no drift.

How do I track changes to a stage plot? Open the history view. Every saved version lists the editor, a timestamp, and a summary of what changed, with the option to restore an earlier version. (This is why collaborators sign in — so each change is attributed.)

What's next

• 🔗 Sharing & Collaborating on a Rider: Link, PDF, Feedback — the full sharing toolkit
• 🔄 Why Your Tech Rider Should Be a Living Document — versioning vs. static PDFs
• 🏆 Best Stage Plot Software for Collaboration & Teams — comparing collaboration models across tools

Further reading

• The technical rider: 6 tips and a template — IMG STAGELINE
• Technical Riders: The Artist & Organizer Guide — UOB LIVE
• List of Apps and Software for Designing Stage Plots — SoundGirls.org

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Last updated: 2026-07-07 · Reviewed by the Techrider.live team · Workflow tested against real festival and club productions.