Folders - Educational accounts

Folders, previously known as shared folders, allow members of your groups or School organization on ThingLink to access and work with the same media. The content inside folders can be edited simultaneously by multiple students working on a group project - for more information, please see the article on Collaborative editing.

Click the links below to quickly jump to different parts of this article:

• What plans can use folders?
• Creating a folder
• Folder visibility settings
• Moving content to a folder
• Managing other users' access to a folder
• Deleting a folder

Availability

Folders are available on all paid educational accounts.

Creating a folder

To create a folder, go to 'My Media' and click a plus icon beneath the Folders heading. Then, enter a title for your new folder and click the blue 'Create' button.

Note that students cannot create folders.

Sharing folder with students

Folders can be set to two privacy settings: 'My organization' or 'Private'. These settings can be managed by opening a folder and clicking the grey 'Settings' button below the folder's thumbnail. 

• 'My organization' folders will be visible to all students tied to your account, or all members of your School on ThingLink.  Every student will be able to edit, delete and change the visibility setting for all content in that folder. They will be able to move their own work to that folder as well.
  Use this setting if you'd like to share a folder with all of your students.
• A 'Private' folder is not visible to other members of your School and student groups unless you grant them access to it. Individual scenes can be viewed by others either as an embed or via a direct link, but they will not be able to edit them. 

Please note that the folder visibility setting does not affect the visibility of individual scenes inside it. A public or unlisted media will be embeddable and shareable via a link even if it's located in a folder.

Moving content to a folder

To move any media to a folder, go to 'My Media', then click the three dots button next to a scene's thumbnail and click 'Move to folder'. Then, select one of the folders and click the blue 'Move' button:

Note that you cannot move content owned by other users, including your students.

You can move content between folders in a similar manner. If you'd like to move content back to your account, open a folder, then click the three dots button next to a scene's thumbnail and select 'Move from folder'. Note that other members of your organization won't be able to edit the media once it's removed from a folder.

Sharing a folder with specific students or teachers

If you'd like to limit a folder to one of your classes or select students working on a specific project, you can create a private folder and follow the steps below.

Adding users

1. Go to a folder and ensure that it's been set to private visibility setting by clicking the 'Settings' button
2. Click the gray 'Manage access' button below the folder's thumbnail
3. In the new popup window, click on the 'Name or email' field. You will be shown a list of all members of your student groups or School. Click on individual users to add them to the folder. You can type in a username or email address to filter the list.
4. Select the level of access:
   • Viewer - the students will see the folder when they log into ThingLink and will be able to view all content inside it. However, they won't be able to edit, clone or otherwise alter the content.
   • Editor - the students will be able to view, edit & delete any content inside the folder and upload their own work. They won't be able to add other students or change the folder's settings.
   • Administrator - the user will be able to edit all content inside the folder, add other users and change the folder's access settings. This is useful if you are trying to collaborate with other teachers.
5. Once you've selected all users you'd like to add, click the blue 'ADD' button.

This will give all users you've selected 'Private access' to the folder. They will be able to view, edit and in other ways manage all content inside the folder.

You can also choose to grant 'Admin access'. Users with admin access to a folder will be able to change the folder's settings, add or remove other users and delete the folder. Simply click on the blue 'Private access' text and choose 'Admin access' instead when adding users.

Changing users' access to a folder

Once a user has been granted access to a folder, you can change their access level or remove them from a folder. To do so, go to a folder, then click the 'Manage Access' button. In the popup window, click on the blue text indicating the user's current access level and select the desired access type. If you choose the 'Revoke access' option, the user will lose access to the folder.

Managing access to 'My Organization' folders

The 'Manage access' functionality is available for 'My organization' folders as well. However, since all members of your School or student groups always have editor access to non-private content inside such folders, granting them a 'Private access' will only allow them to see and edit 'Private' content. Granting 'Admin access' will also allow them to manage the folder.

Deleting a folder

Please note that deleting a folder, unlike deleting a collection, will permanently delete all content inside it. Make sure to move all media you'd like to keep either back to 'My Media', a different folder or another user's account. 

Once you are set on deleting a folder, open it and click the red 'Delete' button below the thumbnail. Only folder's creator, organization admins and users who've been granted admin access to a folder can delete it.