Where can I see the tags?
If the thread you are viewing has been tagged, you can see the list of tags at the top of the thread, like this:
Figure 2.1 - Viewing the tags used in a thread
If you are viewing a forum that uses tags, you can see the most popular tags from all the threads in that forum:
Figure 2.2 - Viewing the most popular tags in a forum
If you wish to see a list of the one hundred most popular tags used in the entire forum, click the "Quick Links" menu in the navigation bar at the top-right of the page and select the "Tags" link from the menu.
Figure 2.3 - Viewing the most popular tags in the entire tag cloud
You have probably also noticed that more frequently used tags appear larger than the less popular tags. Tags are sorted in alphabetical order. You can also view the so-called "tag cloud" at any time simply by typing
www.englishforum.ch/tags into your browser.
How can I actually use these tags?
Just click on one and see what happens. Let's click on the "apartment" tag in the screen we saw in figure 2.3. We are then presented with a list of all threads which have been tagged with "apartment".
Figure 2.4 - Locating threads tagged with "apartment" How can I search for a tag?
Maybe you would like to search for threads with a certain tag, but you can't see it in the list. Remember that the list of all tags only shows you the most popular tags - there may be many more. We search for tags exactly the same way we search for keywords within posts, via the "Search" menu in the navigation bar at the top-right of the page.
When we want to search the forum for keywords, we would use the "Search Forums" box on the search menu, but we want to search for tags, so instead we use the box below that labelled "Search Tags". Let's go ahead and enter our search term:
Figure 2.5 - Searching for tags
This returns a list of all tags containing the word "apartment". Note that we have a few different tags which match this criteria.
Figure 2.5 - Finding all tags containing the word "apartment"
From here the procedure is the same as it was above - simply click the tag you would like and a list of all threads tagged with that tag will be shown.
You will also note that like the normal forum search, the tag search also has an option for "Advanced Search". This allows you to specify far greater control over your search for a tag. This advanced search mode works pretty much the same way as the normal forum advanced search, so we won't discuss this in detail.
If you haven't already done so, you may with to view the
guide to effective searching on the forum, which discussed the advanced search mode in detail.
How can I add a tag?
You already learned how to add tags in lesson one, when you created your thread. What if you would like to add tags to a thread you created earlier? Simply go to your thread and you will see a dialogue box at the top of the thread. Simply enter the relevant tags, separated by commas, then click "Add". For a quick review on how to choose your tags, refer to lesson one above.
Figure 2.6 - Adding tags to your existing thread
Remember that you can only add tags to a thread that you have created, so you won't see that option appear on other people's threads. Now we see that our tags have been added:
Figure 2.7 - Viewing tags on your own thread
Do you notice the [X] after each tag? This leads us to the next question:
How can I delete a tag?
Easy - just click that [X] and the tag will be deleted. If you make a mistake, just add the tag again as per the instructions above. Remember that you will only see the options to delete tags when the tags belong to a thread that you have written.
Will my tags be sent anywhere else?
Yes, all of the tags at English Forum are exported to a service called Zoints. All the tags from the forum are then combined with other tags from other forums into a giant tag cloud. You can see an example of this
here [zoints.com].
Figure 2.8 - Tags sent to a larger tag cloud, EF thread visible in external site's tag list
The exporting of our tags brings many advantages - such as more visibility in search engines and another way that people outside the forum can be attracted to your thread. In the end the choice is yours - better tags (and thread titles) means more and more people may find your thread.
For those who are interested in digging deeper into tags, you can find an in-depth article on the subject
here [shirky.com].
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