You can use tags to add context to other data. Tags are easily searchable. The Tag Picker widget is a simple control that allows a user to select one or more tags, which are typically applied to other data. For example, when a user creates a blog entry, they may wish to add a tag to it, such as Maintenance, to make it easier to search for and find later.

Another common use of tags is for reason codes. For example, a downtime event has occurred. The user can attach one or more tags as reason codes to the downtime event data.

In order to apply tags to data, bind the selected tags (the Tags property) to the service performing the data save. All built-in data writing services take tags as an input parameter. Be sure to use the correct tag type. You cannot use a model tag on data that is collected during run time; the service will fail. Model tags are for the modeling environment only. For run time tagging, you must use data tags.

You can pre-bind the tag picker to a specific vocabulary (such as downtime reason codes) or allow the user to select any vocabulary. The choice depends on the use case.

For information about common widget properties, see Widgets. Properties that are specific to the Tag Picker widget are described in the table below.