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Sharepoint 2010 : Metadata Architecture (part 4) - Managed Metadata

1/10/2014 3:14:53 AM

3. Managed Metadata

Managed Metadata is a hierarchical group of enterprise-wide or centrally managed terms that you can first define and then use in Columns in Content Types or lists and libraries. Managed Metadata is a new type of Column that you can use to assign metadata to an item in SharePoint 2010. SharePoint 2010 uses three terms to refer to Managed Metadata:

  • Managed terms. Think of managed terms as the controlled vocabulary that you will use to assign metadata to content across your solution. Not all metadata values need to be stored and managed as a managed term. Good candidates for managed terms are metadata that have valid values that can or should be organized hierarchically, metadata that is likely to be used in multiple lists and libraries across your solution, or metadata for which there is a restricted list of values from which users can select. As an example, your list of product names is a good candidate for a managed term. Sharing a restricted list of product names across the enterprise ensures that all users will assign the same spelling and name for each product. When you add new products, you can add them in one place and have them available immediately in your entire solution.

  • Managed keywords. As described in the sidebar, managed keywords are words or phrases that have been added by any user to SharePoint 2010 items—either formally in a managed term store or informally as “social tags.” While managed terms can be organized hierarchically, managed keywords are all stored in a flat term set called the Keyword Set.

  • Term store. The term store is the database that is used to store both managed terms and managed keywords.

With Managed Metadata, you can create a “local” label for the shared values. For example, one part of your organization may refer to your external partners as business partners. Another part of the organization may call them third-party organizations. A third part may call them vendors. Even in an ideal world, each part of the company may have valid reasons for referring to these external parties by different names, even though the actual values—the names of the external companies—are the same. In SharePoint 2007, you would have had to try to get everyone to agree to the same label and values and used either manual processes, custom code, or third-party products to ensure that everything stayed synchronized across multiple sites and Site Collections. In SharePoint 2010, you can use Managed Metadata to create the shared list of values once, use the values to help group similar content in search results, but allow each department to refer to the “external people who might be business partners, vendors, or third-party organizations” by whichever Column label makes sense in their context.

Managed Metadata is “consumed” in a Managed Metadata service. You must have at least one Managed Metadata service to share Content Types and managed terms across more than one Site Collection. If you have users that need to keep their term sets private so that other users cannot see them, you will need an additional Managed Metadata service to hold the term store with the private term sets. Then you will need to associate the Site Collection with the Managed Metadata service that holds the term stores approved for that Site Collection.

The Term Store Management Tool is used to create and manage terms and term sets. (Term sets are groups of related terms.) With appropriate permissions (generally, Site Owners with full control privileges), you can use this tool to

  • Create a new term set or delete one that is no longer needed.

  • Add, change, or remove terms.

  • Create a hierarchy for terms and identify which terms in the hierarchy can be used to assign tags to content and which terms are just used for grouping terms. (You typically will want to use only the “lowest level” in the term hierarchy for tagging.)

  • Define alternate terms (synonyms) so that if users use different terms for the same thing or you are introducing a new term to replace an old one, “taggers” will be able to use their familiar term to find a tag, but the new authoritative term will actually be assigned to the document.

  • Import terms from an existing list. Unless you only have a few terms to add to your term set, you will probably want to use the import capability to add your terms. You act on each term independently in the Term Store Management Tool, so while it is convenient to use for updates to existing terms, you will not want to use it to add a large collection of terms.

  • Change managed keywords into managed terms by moving them into a term set. This capability allows you to evolve your managed terms over time. In other words, you don’t have to make yourself crazy trying to define all your managed terms up front. Yes, you should invest some time to plan your initial managed terms, but you can change your mind later on. However, you will need to assign someone to pay attention to how keywords are being used across the site.

There are some helpful worksheets on the Microsoft Web site that you can use to document and plan potential term sets for your solution. You can download the Term Set Planning Worksheet at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=163487&clcid=0x409. Table 2 shows how this worksheet could be used to organize a small set of sports-related products. (The list of product names was borrowed from eBay.) As part of the planning exercise for a term set, you will want to look for existing places where potential term set values are stored (such as product lists, regional office lists, or department lists) and organize the values into a meaningful hierarchy. This process should include a data “clean-up” exercise where you will remove duplicates and rationalize terms (select one term to be the primary value and then identify synonyms for alternative values). Standardizing terms may require negotiating. When it is clear Òthat differences are minor (such as different abbreviations or spellings for the same value), our best advice is to use the “get over it” approach—pick a primary term, make the others synonyms, and move on with your life.

Table 2. Planning a Term Set
 Level 2Level 3Level 4Level 5Level 6Level 7DescriptionAvailable for TaggingSynonym of
Golf       No 
GolfBags      Yes 
GolfBalls        
GolfBooks        
GolfClothing & Shoes        
GolfClothing & ShoesShirts     No 
GolfClothing & ShoesShirtsShort-sleeved shirt   Short sleeved shirt with a collarYes 
GolfClothing & ShoesShirtsLong-sleeved shirt    Yes 
GolfClothing & ShoesShirtsPolo shirt   Short sleeved shirt with a collarYesCollared shirt Short-sleeved shirt
GolfClothing & ShoesPants     No 
GolfClothing & ShoesPantsShort Pants   Appropriate for warm weather.Yes 
GolfClothing & ShoesPantsLong Pants   Appropriate for colder days on the course.Yes 
Exercise & Fitness       No 
Exercise & Fitness Boxing     Yes 
Exercise & Fitness Yoga     Yes 

Figure 3 shows the first step in creating a new term set, accessed from the drop-down list associated with the Site Collection in which you want to create the term set in the Term Store Management Tool. This tool can be accessed from either Central Administration or from within Site Settings.

Figure 3. Create a term set

Figure 4 shows how the term set defined in Table 2 is instantiated. The term set Name and Description are identified, along with an Owner, a Contact, Stakeholders who should be notified before major changes are made to the term set, and whether or not new terms can be added to the term set and whether the term set can be used for tagging.

Figure 4. Define the term set properties

If you plan to manually add terms, or if you need to assign synonyms for terms after you have imported a term set, you will use the term properties editing screen shown in Figure 5. For “parent” terms in the hierarchy, you will see a tab called Custom Sort that allows you to specify a custom sort order to child terms. Using a custom sort order ensures that terms appear in consistent order, even if the default label for a term is changed.

Figure 5. Define managed terms

Figure 6 shows how a description for a managed term appears to the user in Columns with a type of Managed Metadata. The description helps guide the user to select the most appropriate tag for the document.

Figure 6. Descriptions for managed terms help users assign the most appropriate term

Figure 7 shows how the completed worksheet in Table 2 appears in the SharePoint 2010 product managed term set. Once the product term set is defined, it can now be referenced in a Column where the type is Managed Metadata to control the list of values for this term.

 

 

Figure 7. Product hierarchy


Figure 8 shows how the product term set appears to users when it has been associated with a Column called product in a document library. In this example, you can see an instance where the user is attempting to assign a product value of “Collared shirt” to the document. Notice that since Collared shirt has been declared a synonym for “Polo Shirt,” this term is available as a tag. The actual tag value that gets assigned to the document is Polo Shirt, not Collared shirt, because Polo Shirt is the primary term.

Figure 8. Synonyms help users use familiar terms to assign metadata

One of the best features of managed terms is that when you manage term values in a term set and you change the value for a term for any reason, the value will be updated automatically in all the locations where you have used that term. For example, let’s say that you accidentally typed “puter” instead of “putter” in the example here. By the time you realize that the term has been misspelled, several hundred documents have been added and assigned the incorrect term. When you change the spelling of puter to putter in the term set, all of the documents with the incorrect spelling will be automatically corrected, even if you don’t open them. This feature will be particularly useful in organizations like pharmaceutical firms where a drug starts out as a compound and may get several interim names before it gets an official brand name prior to public launch. When the drug is approved, a single change to the term store is all that it takes to assign all content tagged “compound ABC” to “blockbuster drug.” The term compound ABC can also be added as a search synonym for blockbuster drug so that a single search for either term will return all relevant documents, even if the document metadata or content has not been updated with the new managed term. This feature alone should encourage you to carefully plan your use of Managed Metadata.

It may not be necessary to run out and hire a consultant to support this process (though it’s not a bad idea for your first deployment). If your organization has a corporate library staffed with someone with a library science degree, you already have a great resource with the relevant knowledge and experience to guide the planning and implementation of your managed terms hierarchy.

Other  
  •  Sharepoint 2010 : Planning Your Information Architecture - Page Architecture
  •  Sharepoint 2010 : Planning Your Information Architecture - Site Architecture
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