Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Managed Metadata: How to create Term Sets and Terms



In my previous post I have given an introduction to Term Store Management Tool.  In this post I will describe creating Term Sets and Terms.

The foremost thing admins or SharePoint Users doing in Terms Store Management Tool is creating Term Sets and Terms.

In order to create a term set navigate to Term Store Management Tool either by going to Central admin’s managed metadata service application or through Site Settings page in a site collection, you will see the following screen.



To create a Terms Set we need a Group. Right click on Term store such as “Managed Metadata Service” and click “New Group” in the context menu that appears.



New group will appear in the Tree. I have create a Group call Vehicle.



Admin can add multiple users or user groups to manage a group in term store called Group managers. Group managers can add contributors to a group and perform all activities like creating Term Sets and Terms. Contributor are set of users or user groups who can add\edit Term Sets and Terms.

A group can contain multiple Term Sets. Right click on Group name and Click “New Term Set”. User can also import existing Terms Sets. This feature is more useful while migrating terms sets.



In the vehicle Group I have created a Term Set called “Cars”.



A number of properties are available to be set for Term Set. On the General Tab, Owner of the Term Set is the one who manages the Term Set and can restrict users to perform task in Term Set. The current user creating the Term Set automatically comes here. Stakeholders can be given if some needs to be informed of changed made to term set. Submission Policy is important if Admin wants all users to add new Terms in term set then open should be selected.

On the Intended Use tab, an option for Terms to be available for tagging and the other for availability of Terms to be used as Site navigation are available. Many SharePoint sites use Terms set for Site Navigation so this can used as required.



Next one is Custom Sort tab, where sorting option can be set for terms under the specific Term Set. Terms can be sorted according to selected languages or irrespective of a language.



Custom Properties tab offers to add custom properties for terms. These properties are key value pair and are available for all term in a term set.

Now we can Create a new Term in the newly create Term set called Cars. Right click on Cars Term Set and select Create Term from the context menu.



A single term set can be restricted from tagging by uncheck the first option “Available for Tagging” on the General tab. Language can be selected from the dropdown. Only the installed languages appear here. Synonyms for the Term label or description of abbreviations can be given in Other Labels field.



Custom Properties tab offer to add multiple custom properties other than the given. Custom properties defined in Term Set along with the one uniquely declared for this specific Term.

Once all the properties are set Term is ready for use.

Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Term Store Management Tool

Terms sets can be managed through Term Store Management tool in SharePoint 2013.follwoing are the key functionalities which can be performed through the tool.

·         Create or delete a term set.

·         Add, change, or delete terms.

·         Arrange managed terms in a term set into a hierarchy.

·         Define synonyms.

·         Import terms.

·         Make enterprise keywords into managed terms by moving them into a term set.

In order to perform the above mentioned tasks, user must have permission on management tool i.e. administrator, Group Manager or contributor.

Term Store Management Tool can be accessed by going to Central Administration à Application Management à Manage Web Application à Managed Metadata Service application.
Or
Got to your site collection à Site Settings à Term Store Management under the Site Administration section.


This will open the following screen.
In the left pan on the above screen, search allows user to search terms and keywords. To view specific to a language select the language from drop down under the Taxonomy Term store. In the tree view, a hierarchy of all the term sets and term are shown for selected managed metadata service. Multiple service application can be created to use in a single site collection. Term sets and terms are available in each site according to access rights defined in it. We will discuss creating terms sets and terms later.

Multiple user or user groups can be given rights to manage a Term store. Term store administrator can be defined in the service application default settings.



 

Monday, August 10, 2015

Managed Metadata: Terms, Term Sets, Term Store


Managed metadata is user defined centrally managed hierarchical collection of terms used as stored attributes in SharePoint. Managed metadata is used to refine search results and allows user to have better control over documents filtering and sorting like features.

The Term can be associated with an item in SharePoint like a document and a collection of such terms is call Term Set. All Term Sets are stored in a specific TermStore. Terms and Term Sets are not hard bound to a specific column in a site but can be independently managed either at site collection level or globally in Managed Metadata service application.

Terms Sets managed at site collection level are called Local Terms while the terms created outside the scope of site collection are called Global Terms sets. Term managers can be associated to a term set to manage a Term set at global level and these are available to all users for use at site level depending upon the availability set by Term Set manager.

Terms can be classified into two types:

·         Managed terms: usually pre-defined, mostly hierarchical, user defined and can be controlled with permissions.

·         Enterprise keywords: simple words or phrases added against SharePoint items. These are non-hierarchical under a keyword set.

Sunday, August 9, 2015

Problem: The default termstore for this site cannot be identified

Problem:

The default termstore for this site cannot be identified
 
The above mentioned problem can occur while trying to add a new site column or new column in a library of type Managed Metadata.
 
 
 
if admin of a SharePoint site select option "Customize your term set" under the setting Term Set Settings and default termstore settings are not check in Manage Metadata service application, it will not allow admin to add customize settings for Term Set.
 
Solution:
 
1. Go to Central Administration --> Manage Web Application --> Manage Service Applications
2. Select Manage Metadata Service
 
 
3. Select Properties from top ribbon, a dialogue will appear.
 
4. Select the option "This service application is the default storage location for column specific term sets."
 
Click Ok and now you can add Termstore Settings for new column.