[Koha] Patron permissions questions

[Agnes Rivers-Moore]

Hello all

I work with a few libraries testing Koha, and a question has come up 
about setting permissions for "patrons".

As I understood this, permissions are for staff accounts only, to 
control their use of the staff client modules, based on their login. I 
see in the list of permissions that there is one flag (permissions) to 
set user permissions, and another (staffaccess) to modify permissions 
for staff users, and this confuses me as they seem to be the same.

It has been noticed that the permissions screen exists for all patron 
types, and I have had some confused questions about whether staff have 
to check the "Borrow books" permission before anything can be checked 
out to a new patron, and why we need a "staff" type at all if any patron 
can be set to use the staff client. 
I can see their point, so I am wondering:

Can someone explain the difference between those two permission flags?

Has anyone used permissions for patrons who are not on staff, and if so 
what for?

Could this screen be set not to appear except for specific patron types, 
e.g. "Staff" (even for superlibrarians)?

Thank you all,
Agnes

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Agnes Rivers-Moore
Assistant Librarian
Hanover Public Library