Groups & Collections
When working on a project, you certainly create a lot of documents which need to be managed in some way. By default, all documents are kept in a flat hierarchy in your Document Browser. If you only work with 10 or less documents, keeping an overview should be pretty easy. Once your project and the number of your documents grows larger and larger, you most probably want to structure them in some way. Ulysses gives you two powerful tools that allow you to keep all your documents always at hand: the Document Filter and Groups & Collections.
Before going into the very details of these tools, lets first go over the interface of the Groups & Collections panel.
On the very top of the left panel, you can see the Document Filter. It is used to only show a portion of the Document Browser below. It consists of two elements: The Filter Field and the Filter Button.
The Filter Field is your primary location to search in your project and works pretty much like any standard search box: to find a string, select a search range via the magnifier on the left and then enter the string you're searching for. Documents matching the search criteria will then be moved to the top of the Document Browser with the search phrase highlighted. All other documents will be moved to the bottom of the browser with their titles grayed out.
If you click the Filter Button right next to the Filter Field, Groups & Collections are shown. This panel shows all Filters, Groups and Collections that you have created so far. Clicking on one of these will reveal their respective contents in the Browser. If you want to create such a new Filter, Collection or Group, Ctrl-click inside the panel and select the respective entry.
Let's finally come Collections, Filters and Groups. With these powerful tools, you can create views of your whole project, which consists of a subset of your documents. This way you can not only structure your project better, but also get a quick overview of your project access your documents faster.
- A Collection is similar to a folder. They fulfill the basic usage of putting documents that you want to keep together. A single document can be in many collections at the same time, which gives Collections a great advantage over classical folders.
For Collections, we tried to adept the "natural" way to organize your documents. It's kind of like organizing files in Finder. To add a document to a Collection, simply drag & drop it into your Collection. - Filters are more advanced that Collections. They could be best described as "auto-updating search queries". They are pretty similar to Apple's implementation of Smart Folders or Smart Mailboxes. By selecting a Filter from the list, the Document Browser will only show the documents that match the specified criteria. This is what basically distinguishes Collections from Filters: Filters allow you to categorize your documents automatically, Collections allow you to do that by hand.
Let me give you a small example for Filters: imagine you want to keep an overview which documents still need some editing before they can be sent to your publisher. Apply a status to them, for example "Work in Progress", and then create a Filter with the condition that it only contains documents whose status is "Work in Progress" (you can always add more conditions if you want). All documents with this status are added. Whenever you remove or add a document with this status, it's also removed/added to the Filter. - Maybe one day your project has grown so big, that even with Collections and Filters handling your documents becomes difficult. You'd need something to organize Collections and Filters. This is where Groups come in. For every set of Filters or Collections that belong together, create a Group and drag & your Filters and Collections in them. And even better, you can put Groups into other Groups and thereby nest them.
It is very important to remember that Groups can only contain Filters and Collections. Documents are only part of a Group if they are in one of the Group's children.
Every Group also has a little arrow attached to its right, the Focus Button. As the name already suggests, clicking on that button shifts your focus on the current Group. Only this Group will be shown both in the Groups & Collections panel in the Document Browser, so you can't be distracted Documents outside the Group anymore. To get back to the original view, simply hit that button again.
Each instance of these tools has a color so you can always identify them easily. By default, Filters are green, Collections are yellow and Groups are blue. As always, you can change these colors in the Preferences if they're not fancy enough.
Ulysses also has two special views in the Groups & Collections panel: Unfiled Documents and the Document Trash. The first view contains all documents that are neither part of a Collections nor of a Filter. The second kind, Document Trash, is kind of like the trash of Mac OS X. If you move a document to the trash, it's removed from every Filter and Collection it belonged to and is only available in the Trash. You can always "put it back" and everything will be back to normal and all its relations to Collections and Filters are kept intact. Documents are only irreversibly deleted when you empty the trash.
If you want, you can keep your trashed documents visible in the Groups & Collections view; they'll be grayed out and you can only preview them, not open them. We've got some more neat tips on the Document Trash in Hidden Gem #9 
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If you Ctrl-Click inside the Groups & Collections panel, you can find plenty of options to adjust the appearance of the panel. For example, you can Show/Hide the Document Trash or the Hidden Filters. Another useful option is "Cumulated View". If this view is enabled, the documents are not grouped by Filter/Collection anymore in the Document Browser, but are shown as a simple list. If you want to edit a single entry in the panel, simply double-click it. Especially interesting are the entries for unfiled documents or the Document Trash. For instance, you can set its position in the panel or automatically switch to the Unfiled filter when you create a new document.
Another set of options are available when you set up a new Collection, Filter or Group. For instance, you can display the document count by clicking on the appropriate checkbox. Or you can hide the Filter or Group when it becomes empty. You know, could there be anything better than a Todo-Filter that vanishes when all documents that still needed some work are finished and no documents belonging to that Filter remain?
We have created a Screencast that covers Collections, Filters, Groups, the "All" and "Unfiled" View and the Document Trash.
- How do I create a Collection, Filter or Group?
- The easiest way is probably to Ctrl-Click inside the Groups & Collections panel and select the appropriate entry. Alternatively, you can also Ctrl-Click the Filter Button. A little sheet will appear where you can enter the name for the Collection/Filter/Group and below the input field some checkboxes are shown. For instance, you can show the document counts in parentheses behind the name.
If you create a Filter, you can also set the conditions, under which documents are filtered. Clicking on the plus-button reveals a new row to add another condition.
- The easiest way is probably to Ctrl-Click inside the Groups & Collections panel and select the appropriate entry. Alternatively, you can also Ctrl-Click the Filter Button. A little sheet will appear where you can enter the name for the Collection/Filter/Group and below the input field some checkboxes are shown. For instance, you can show the document counts in parentheses behind the name.
- How do I add documents to a Collection?
- There are two principal ways to accomplish this:
- Make sure the Filter Button is pressed (i.e., the Filter View is visible). Select one or more documents in the browser. Drag the documents to the desired Collection in the Filter View.
- Select one or more documents in the Browser. Ctrl-Click on one of the selected documents. A menu will pop up, and one entry will read "Add to Collection". Select the desired Collection.
- There are two principal ways to accomplish this:
- Can I add a document to multiple Collections?
- Yes, of course! A Collection is only a view of your documents. Adding a document to a Collection is like adding a link that points to the document.
- Just grab the document in the Browser and drag it out of it. It will resolve into little nice clouds – not being deleted (however, this will only work when the Cumulated View is disabled). Alternatively, you can Ctrl-click it and select "Move to Trash…".
- All documents are nicely organized in your Ulysses project instead of being cluttered all over the folders.
You can also keep documents in different Groups or Filters simultaneously.
- This little arrow is called the Focus Button. It allows you to switch your focus entirely into one group to concentrate on it with a single click. It will look like the group you’re currently in is the only one, helping you to focus and not be distracted by the other documents. However, getting back to the original view is as easy as clicking one button as well.
- To enable the Document Trash, Ctrl-click into the Groups & Collections panel, then select "Show Document Trash". Or hold the Filter Button for a couple of seconds and select the same option.
The Trash will only be visible if there's at least one document in it.
- Ctrl-click it in the Document Browser, then select "Move to Trash…" or simply drag & drop it on the Document Trash. To "put it back" into your project, Ctrl-click it again in the Trash and select "Remove from Trash".
- Yes! If you select a document within a Collection and choose to trash it, you can restore it later. Either from within that Collection (see below) or from within the trash. You don’t have to remember which Collection the document was in – Ulysses knows and will put it back in place. This is true for multiple Collections also. And for Filters, of course.
- A document can only be irreversibly deleted (apart from your regularly created backups), if you empty the trash. This can be accomplished by Ctrl-Clicking the panel and selecting "Empty Document Trash…".