Collections!

Originally shared by Ted Ewen

Collections!
Or: I can finally collect my posts by topic!
aka: I can finally follow specific topics from a person!
 
So, I am sure you have probably seen announcement of Collections. I am sure you have some questions or points of confusion, so I thought I would write this to help you out.
 
TL;DR: If you leave everything to the default settings you will notice no difference in your streams, other than the fact that posts in collections will have a small header showing the collection they are a part of.
 
What are collections? Collections are a way of organising your posts, both new and old, by topic or content. In a way they are like tags. In a way they are like communities. In a way they are just like the G+ you have always used.

Where you used to share a post publicly or to specific circles, you can now also share them to your collections. They will behave just like private and public posts always have, appearing on your profile and in the stream of those who have you circled. As an added bonus, these posts are collected in one convenient place. Kinda like our own magazines!
 
How do I create collections?  You create them using the collections interface, available from the top-central menu bar or via the main drop-down menu. Select collections and click on Create a Collection (see image below, top left). Give it a name and choose whether it is private or public. This choice can not be changed and private collections do not behave quite the way one might expect. For example, if I have a post shared between myself and one other user and I have a private collection which only we can see, I can *not* move that post to that collection, even though the distribution lists match.
 
Once it is created, your collection will appear as a card in the list next to Create a Collection (again, see image below). Click on it to enter the collection.  You can change the cover image and background colour by clicking on the customise button. Background colours are limited to the palette presented.
 
The cover image is interactive in collections. The top and bottom are truncated in the default view. By clicking on the image, you can expand it to the crop chosen when the image was initially selected as the cover.  There are no visual guides for the truncation, but a little trial and error will get you there.
 
You can change the name of a collection by clicking on the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the cover image and selecting edit. Also take note of the setting available here: *People who have you in circles automatically follow this collection*. By default everyone who has you circled will be set to follow your public collections. THIS EXACTLY MIMICS PRE-COLLECTION BEHAVIOUR. 
 
As mentioned above, if you do nothing to the settings around collections and as long as the collection owner does not change that setting, you will see no real difference from collections.
 
You mean I can finally stop seeing all those  #tedscousins posts? How do I remove a collection from my stream?
Pout. Yes, yes you can. Just go to a profile, click on collections, and you will see all that user's collections you have access to, public and private.  Just click where it says *FOLLOWING* on the collection you wish to mute. It will change to *FOLLOW *and you are unsubscribed. Click on *FOLLOW *on any collection of interest to add it to your stream.
 
How Do I post to a Collection?
If you are posting a new post, just put the collection you want the post in where you would normally put PUBLIC or a circle name. That's it. Post as normal and the post will appear in both your stream and will be available in the collection. Easy, no?
 
How do I move existing posts to a collection
If the post is yours you can use the dropdown menu (the down pointing carat in the top right of every post) and select move post to collection, select the collection from the list and hit *move to collection*. Done and dusted. Note: posts may only be in *one* collection.   If it is someone else's post, just share it as normal, selecting the target collection.
 
I put a post in the wrong collection. How do I move it?
Well, you don't. You have to remove it first. Use the same drop down menu as we used to move the post in  (top right corner of the post) and select *remove from collection*. You may then add it to the proper collection as detailed above. *Note: *it can take several seconds for the menu in the post to catch up after removing a post from a collection. If *move to collection* is not in the menu, wait a few seconds and try again.
 
Is there any way to bulk move my old posts into collections?
Well, no. You will have to move each post individually. For those of us with many thousand posts, this will be tedious and time consuming.
 
If you are going to try moving a large number of posts to collections from your stream, I strongly suggest creating all the collections first. If you are several pages down in your stream and you want to move a post to a new collection, you will have to open a new tab and create it. Unfortunately, the collection selection list does not update on that change: you have to reload the stream or post, and add it to the new collection. If you are working through your stream this means you will have to scroll down through several pages to find your place again , for every collection you forgot at the start.
 
There you have it. What I've learned of Collections in the short time I've been able to mess with them. If you see anything I have wrong, have any questions or comments, don't hesitate to let me know below. 
 
I'm really interested to see how you all make use of this new feature.