Organizing your content in 'collections'
Collections are a very flexible way of organizing your content in an app.
Here are some use cases for collections:
- create a collection with your articles for the day / the week (more or less like a traditional issue)
- divide your content into different sections, each their own collection, so browse pages can then allow you to go a level deeper to another browse page for a particular section
- publish a catalog with each chapter (or sub-chapter) represented by one or more collections
A Twixl app will always start with one initial browse page when the app starts, that will be based on the 'root collection'. The root collection will always have to be present and cannot be deleted.
Note that collection links can not only contain different articles ('content items'), but can also have 'Collection links', i.e. links to other "subcollections".
A collection can be set to open in browse mode, in which case it will display the browse grid for all the items in the collection. If a collection is set to open in detail mode, it will automatically open the first article (content item) in that collection. A reader can then browse from article to article in the collection by swiping. When opening in detail mode, the selected Sort mode will determine which article will be considered the first.
Except for the root collection itself, all collections can be offered as In-App Purchases. In that case, make sure your product identifier matches the one in App Store Connect Connect and/or Google Play.
Setting the 'root collection'
When you are in the 'root collection', and you edit the settings, there is the option to change which collection is used for the 'root'.
If you decide you want to change the collection that is used as the 'root', you'll get an extra warning explaining the consequences. The collection you select will be renamed to 'Root'. The former root collection will be renamed to 'Root - Before dd/mm/yyyy'.
Collection links
A Collection Link is a very flexible type of content item: it allows you to link to other collections in your app. When you create a collection link, an unique ID is generated for you automatically. You can change that ID but the name needs to be unique.
The title will be displayed in the cell for the content item. You can then select the collection to link to and determine the item style.
Custom URL schemes for navigation in your app
For a complete overview of the different custom URL schemes that can be used in an app, please refer to this article.