Hub vs StoryMap Collection vs Category Gallery Instant App to share your resources

[Kylie]

I recently provided mapping activities for an elementary school STEM night. To present them to the students, I considered a few options: an ArcGIS StoryMap Collection, and an ArcGIS Hub Gallery, and a Category Gallery Instant App.

Each creates a simple, easy-to-read page that lets the students explore, choose an activity of interest, and jump into it. While I gathered the activities I wanted to share, I thought about if I should use a Hub Gallery, a StoryMap Collection, or a Category Gallery app. I knew that any choice would provide a quick way to create a web page linking to the activities I wanted to share, complete with showing the titles and images from the activities themselves. So how to choose which to use?

To see an example of the same content in each format, you can see the test sites I created for the STEM night:

StoryMap Collection for STEM night	Hub Gallery for STEM night
Category Gallery Instant App for STEM night

So which one is better?

One consideration is the experience of the person using the page. There are some differences in what a student sees:

1. Hub Galleries and the Category Gallery app show the activity descriptions, but they are missing from StoryMap Collections. 
2. StoryMap Collections and the Category Gallery app have a consistent format and layout, while Hub Galleries are part of a page that is laid out however the author decides.
3. Category Gallery apps support only a title around the activities. StoryMap Collections support some surrounding text but are focused on the activities. Hub Galleries can have as much text and as many varied components around them on the page as the author decides.

The other consideration is the work required to create one and the differences in the authoring experience:

1. Upon creation, Category Gallery apps and StoryMap Collections are ready for you to add your resources. In a Hub, you first have to add a Gallery to your page's layout. Configuring the gallery gives you the ability to search for and add content from ArcGIS, showing the title, description, and icon. 
2. StoryMap Collections support content in ArcGIS as well as content from outside your ArcGIS account by uploading or linking to images, videos, PDFs, or other embeddable content (like websites and apps). Category Gallery apps and Hub Galleries are limited to content from ArcGIS. 
3. Adding items you didn't make into a StoryMap Collection means finding them in ArcGIS Online, favoriting them, then adding them to the collection. (In the StoryMap Collection interface, you can explore your favorites but not all public facing ArcGIS Online content.) During the configuration of a Hub Gallery, you can browse all ArcGIS Online content. To make a Category Gallery app, you first need to create a group of the content. During creation of the group, you can browse all ArcGIS Online content.
4. A Hub Gallery can be populated manually or dynamically based on a group, tag, category, or content type. The content in a Category Gallery app is driven by a group. For both the Hub Gallery and the Content Gallery app, this allows you to change the content presented without having to edit the page. The content in a StoryMap Collection is manually selected, and the page must be edited to change what is shown. 
5. Hub Galleries support up to 16 items. StoryMap Collections can have a maximum of 60 items. Category Gallery apps don't have an item limit.
6. Once your resources are identified, a StoryMap Collection is ready to go. It only needs a title and an optional bit of text. Once the group is created and the app configured with some minimal choices, a Category Gallery app is ready to go. A Hub Gallery is part of a larger Hub page and requires work to get the page feeling complete. 

So which one did I use, and how did I choose?

For this event, I used the Hub Gallery. I wanted to have more context around the activities, and more information than just activities. Placing additional items into the hub page's layout let me do so (for example, the QR code to use the page at home, and information on how the students could access GIS software). I'm also comfortable creating Hub sites and working in HTML (which can come into play for some Hub layouts), so those weren't hurdles for me. 

Your choice might differ. What's your comfort level, and what do you need on your page?

Here we explored StoryMap Collections, Hub Galleries, and Category Gallery Instant Apps as ways to distribute activities to students. But those aren't the only use cases for this kind of setup. You can use a similar concept and make a collection of resources you often use, or a progression through activities where students must go in order. Or perhaps you want to gather resources to share with another teacher. Maybe it's even just a way to gather the resources you know you recommend time and time again so that you have one place to quickly access them all. Whatever your need, a Storymap Collection, a Hub Gallery, or a Category Gallery Instant App is an effective way to organize and share content, and your project and skills will help determine which to use. Now, what do you need to organize?