Daryo Apr 3, 2016:

the intended audience will / is presumed to / ought to know the difference between these two categories of "users"; OTOH, it won't hurt if you want to be more precise.

Scott de Lesseps (asker) Mar 29, 2016:

Daryo, your explanation helps a lot. To avoid confusing the reader by using "user", what do you think about simply saying "not modifiable by the developer"?

Scott de Lesseps (asker) Mar 28, 2016:

Thanks Daryo and Philippa Thanks for your comments. I was also considering "modifiable" or "editable" as a possible solution.

Daryo Mar 28, 2016:

to be more precise you have at least two categories of "users" for this software:

you have the "end users" who are just filling the on-screen forms [doing the "data inputting"], and if what they enter fails the "validation criteria" they get as reply an "error message" on the screen - these "users" can NEVER do anything about the "data validation error messages";

but those who are creating the forms [database developers? they didn't create the software, so they are also "users", kind of] are in position to program data validation criteria and responses to wrong inputs - having the possibility to create their own "error messages" and so guide the end-user in filling correctly the form is huge bonus for them; thus a software where "Les messages d'alerte ne sont pas contribuables" is far from being a top-notch software ...

Philippa Smith Mar 27, 2016:

Scott, I think your analysis is right, that users can't add any data to the warning messages, so extrapolating from that, maybe you could simply use 'modifiable', as in, 'the warning messages are not modifiable/cannot be modified' or 'users cannot modify/are not authorised to modify...', the logic being that input added = a modification.

Scott de Lesseps (asker) Mar 27, 2016:

Thanks Phil and Francis I don't really see how "taxed" or "charged" could fit here, unless I'm missing something. I guess I actually should have said the document concerns "data input controls", to verify the user data is valid. Phil, the other poster in the other Kudoz question mentioned "filled in", which was the angle I was approaching it from. "Filling in" as in the user entering the input data was how I was looking at it.