Managing app collections
Contents
Requirements
AppsAnywhere 2.12+
Overview
App collections are groups of apps which can be highlighted to the user. There are five types of app collection - Favorites, Desktops, New, Recent and Category. Favorites, Desktops, New, and Recent are preconfigured collections, and the apps within them are dynamically generated based on specific conditions (for example, the apps that the user has favorited), while Category collections are associated to a specific category and contain the apps in the associated category. These Category collections are useful to highlight particularly important categories, or place them on the main search screen in addition to the app grid.
App collections can appear in either the search page or the app grid page, and the App Collections settings page contains options for both of these pages for each collection.
Navigating to the app collections settings page
Prerequisites
System administrator privileges
Steps
Log in to AppsAnywhere admin
Search for App collections in the search box., or expand the Settings section and click App collections in the sidebar
The highlighted app collections screen in the admin settings menu
Preconfigured collections
These are collections that are built in to AppsAnywhere and are available out of the box. Each of these collections is intended to solve a common use case, reducing the burden of use for both users and administrators of AppsAnywhere alike.
Recent
It’s common for people to use a small number of apps regularly. Recent exists to provide quick access to apps users are most likely to need - those that they’ve recently used. To speed up finding these apps when accessing the portal, those that have been used recently are added to this collection automatically for the user. When an app is launched by a user, it appears in their “recent” collection, with up to a maximum of 20 apps tracked at any one time.
The “recent” collection is configured to appear on both the search and app grid pages by default, but can be removed from either of these pages by the administrator.
Favorites
If a user knows they regularly, or occasionally, need access to particular apps, favorites is a great solution. To speed up finding these apps when accessing the portal, the user can mark them as favorites via the more info page. When an app is favorited by a user, it appears in their “favorites” collection. When combined with recent, favorites could be used by users for the apps they use less frequently, but still want quick access to.
The ‘favorites’ collection is configured to appear on both the search and app grid pages by default, but can be removed from either of these pages by the administrator.
Desktops
It can be difficult for users to tell apps and desktops apart at a glance; to help with this, the desktops collection can provide a quick and easy way for the user to view all desktops that they have access to.
The “desktops” collection is not configured to appear on both the search and app grid pages by default, because not every customer uses desktops, but can be added to either of these pages by the administrator.
New
New shows the most recently added applications - which is a great way for users to find apps they might not have used before, or have been waiting for. To speed up finding these apps when accessing the portal, those that have been recently added to the system will appear in this collection automatically. When an app is added to AppsAnywhere, it appears in the “new” collection for users for which it is provisioned. Applications disappear from this collection after one month.
The “new” collection is configured to appear on both the search and app grid pages by default, but can be removed from either of these pages by the administrator.
An example: adding the Favorites collection to a section
The favorites collection can be configured to appear in the search page and app grid page.
Prerequisites
System administrator privileges
You must decide whether you would like the favorites collection to appear on the Search page, the App grid, or both
Steps
Navigate to the App collections page
Click the Add new collection button. The collection name will be pre-defined, in order to provide automatic translations into each supported language
Set the Type to ‘Favorites’
Select whether you want the collection to appear on the Search screen, the Grid screen or both
Click the Save collections button
An example of a configured Favorites collection
An example: removing the favorites collection from a section
Prerequisites
System administrator privileges
Steps
Navigate to the app collections page
Find the Favorites collection and click the Remove button
Click the Save search collections or Save app grid collections button, depending on which section you are editing
If you would like to remove favorites from more an additional, return to step 2.
An example of the removal of the Favorites collection, with the Remove button highlighted
Category collections
Grouping related applications together into categories can help users find their apps more quickly, and discover new ones. Once apps have been grouped into categories, app collections allows you to promote categories in additional places. This could be useful if you have a large number of categories set up and want to make some of them more prominent.
If a category is assigned to a collection on the app grid page, then it will appear in the sidebar twice, in both the list of app collections under “Home”, and under the Categories section. This may not be necessary if you only have a small number of categories, but as that list grows it may make more sense to highlight some of them.
Adding a new category collection
Each category collection is of course linked to a category, so before configuring the collection you should have set up the corresponding category.
Prerequisites
System administrator privileges
A category to link the new collection to
HINT If a category you have recently added does not appear in the list, you can use the Reload categories button to refresh the list of categories.
Steps
Navigate to the App collections page
Click the Add new collection button
In the Collection name field, type the name of the collection. This will often be the name of the category.
Set the Type to “Category”
In the Category field, select the name of the category which you want to display
Click the Save collections button
An example of the Reload categories button in place
An example of a category collection
Ordering app collections
The order in which collections appear in the list determines the order in which they are presented to the user. You can change the order in which they appear by following these instructions.
For new users, the first collection in the list that has Search visibility set is the one that will be immediately visible, unless Default to "Apps" on the Portal home screen is selected.
Prerequisites
System administrator privileges
At least two app collections set up in any section
Steps
Navigate to the App collections page
Click the Reorder collections button
Drag and drop via the handles beside the collection name, or click the up and down arrows to change the order of each collection until you achieve the desired order
Once you have finished reordering the collections, click Save order. This will automatically save the collections
App collections with the reorder collections button highlighted
App collections in the process of being reordered, with the save order button highlighted