Creating and Managing a Collection in Vault

Overview of Collections

Vault makes it easy to manage your data using ‘Collections’, which allows you to organize your data in a straightforward file folder structure. This article provides an overview of the Collections page in Vault, how to create a collection, and how to manage a collection. 

In this article

• Overview of Collections
• About the Collections Page
• How to Create a Collection
• How to Manage a Collection
• Related Content

About the Collections Page

Collections can be created, managed, and viewed from the Collections page in Vault. This page displays three panels that you can interact with to create, view, and manage your collections:

Screenshot of the Collection Page.

1. Directory Panel

• • This panel provides a directory tree of your collections and folders, which you can expand and collapse to view collections, folders, and sub-folders. Selecting a collection or folder from the Directory panel will update the Content panel and Details panel to display the content and details related to the selected collection or folder.

  • The Directory panel also has the ‘New’ button which you can use to create collections and folders for existing collections.
    
    

2. Content Panel

• • This panel allows you to manage your collections and navigate through each collection and folder to display their contents, which include: Name, Uploader, Modified date, and File Size. Each content type (collection, folder, file) has a respective icon that displays beside the name.

  • Important Navigation Tips:

    • To open a collection or folder, hover over it and double-click. This will navigate into the collection or folder to display its content. If you hover over a collection or folder in the Content Panel and single-click, this will update the Details Panel.

    • To manage your collections, folders, and files, right-click to display a menu of relevant action items. If you want to make bulk changes, you can select the checkbox beside each item. Once multiple items are selected, any right-click action will be executed on all the selected files.

Actions Available For Collections	Actions Available For Folders	Actions Available For Files

Call for feedback: We know the current UI and “user journey” related to button versus right-click actions is not ideal. We want to improve it and find a way to make access to actions easier across the panels and functions. Feedback is especially welcomed from our pilot community on this topic! Please email our product team at vault@archive.org.

3. Details Panel

• This panel displays detailed information about any collection, folder, or file that has been selected from the Directory or Content panels. You can click the info icon to open and close this panel.
• Information that displays in this panel includes:

How to Create a Collection

How to create a collection from the Dashboard:

1. Click ‘Create New’ from the ‘Collections’ panel
2. Click the ‘New’ button on the Collections page
3. Select ‘Collection’ from the dropdown menu
4. Enter the Collection name and click ‘OK’

Creating a collection from the dashboard. 

How to create a collection from the top navigation bar:

1. Click ‘Collections’ from the top navigation bar
2. Click the ‘New’ button on the Collections page
3. Select ‘Collection’ from the dropdown menu
4. Enter the Collection name and click ‘OK’
   

How to add a folder to a collection:

Prerequisite: You need to create a collection before you can create folders.

1. Select the collection or folder you want to add a folder to (either from the Directory or Content Panel)
2. Click the ‘New’ button in the Directory Panel and select ‘Folder’ from the dropdown menu.
3. Enter the Folder name and click ‘OK’.
4. The new folder will display in the Directory and Content Panel in the location you had selected.

Creating a collection and adding a folder to it.

How to Manage a Collection

Your collections can be managed through the action menus available by right-clicking on your desired collection, folder, or file. If you want to make bulk changes, you can select the checkbox beside each item. Once multiple items are selected, any right-click action will be executed on all the selected files.

Actions Available For Collections	Actions Available For Folders	Actions Available For Files

How to Move Folders and Files from a Collection

1. Select your desired folder or file from the Directory panel or Content panel.
2. Right-click on the folder or file and select ‘Move’ from the more actions menu.
3. Select the folder or Collection you want to move the folder or file to and click 'Move here'. 
   • Tip: to navigate to your desired collection or folder, you can use the back arrow button to navigate out of a collection or folder, or double-click on a collection folder to navigate in. 
4. The folder or file will now display in its new location. 

Moving a folder into a different folder.

How to Deposit Content from a Collection

From the Collections page, you can deposit content directly into a Collection. For more detailed instructions on how to do this, see Depositing Content in Vault. 

How to Download Content from the Collection Page

You can download files from your Collection Page from the Content panel and the Details panel.

To download a file from the Content panel:

1. Right-click on the file and select ‘Download’ from the More actions menu.

To download a file from the Details panel:

1. Select your file from the Directory panel or Content panel.
2. From the Details panel, scroll down to the bottom of the Details tab and click the ‘Download’ button.

Related Content

• Getting Started with Vault
• Interpreting the Vault Dashboard
• Depositing Content in Vault
• Administering Your Vault Account

Last updated on July 6, 2022.