AEM Tagging Framework

Last update: August 15, 2024

Applies to:
Experience Manager 6.5

Topics:
Developing,Tagging

CREATED FOR:

Developer

Tagging allows content to be categorized and organized. Tags can be classified by a namespace and a taxonomy. For detailed information about using tags:

See the document Using Tags for information about tagging content as a content author.
See the document Administering Tags for an administrator’s perspective about creating and managing tags, and to which content tags have been applied.

This article focuses on the underlying framework which supports tagging in AEM and how to use it as a developer.

Introduction

To tag content and use the AEM Tagging infrastructure:

The tag must exist as a node of type [cq:Tag](#tags-cq-tag-node-type) under the taxonomy root node.
The tagged content node’s NodeType must include the cq:Taggable mixin.
The TagID is added to the content node’s cq:tags property and resolves to a node of type [cq:Tag](#tags-cq-tag-node-type).

Tags : cq:Tag Node Type

The declaration of a tag is captured in the repository in a node of type cq:Tag.

A tag can be a simple word (for example, sky) or represent a hierarchical taxonomy (for example, fruit/apple, meaning both the generic fruit and the more specific apple).

Tags are identified by a unique TagID.

A tag has optional meta information such as a title, localized titles, and a description. The title should be displayed in user interfaces instead of the TagID, when present.

The tagging framework also provides the ability to restrict authors and site visitors to use only specific, predefined tags.

Tag Characteristics

Node type is cq:Tagn
Node name is a component of the TagID.
The TagID always includes a namespace.
The jcr:title property (the title to display in the UI) is optional.
The jcr:description property is optional.
When containing child nodes, the tag is referred to as a container tag.
The tag is stored in the repository below a base path called the taxonomy root node.

Because tags are simply JCR nodes, the node names must abide by the JCR naming convention.

TagID

A TagID identifies a path which resolves to a tag node in the repository.

Typically, the TagID is a shorthand TagID starting with the namespace or it can be an absolute TagID starting from the taxonomy root node.

When content is tagged, if it does not yet exist, the [cq:tags](#tagged-content-cq-tags-property) property is added to the content node and the TagID is added to the property’s String array value.

The TagID consists of a namespace followed by the local TagID. Container tags have subtags that represent a hierarchical order in the taxonomy. Subtags can be used to reference tags same as any local TagID. For example, tagging content with fruit is allowed, even if it is a container tag with subtags, such as fruit/apple and fruit/banana.

Taxonomy Root Node

The taxonomy root node is the base path for all tags in the repository. The taxonomy root node must not be a node of type cq:Tag.

In AEM, the base path is /content/cq:tags and the root node is of type cq:Folder.

Tag Namespace

Namespaces let you group things. The most typical use case is a namespace per site (for example, public, internal, and portal) or per larger application (for example, WCM, Assets, Communities). But namespaces can be used for various other needs. Namespaces are used in the user interface to only show the subset of tags (that is, tags of a certain namespace) that is applicable to the current content.

The tag’s namespace is the first level in the taxonomy subtree, which is the node immediately below the taxonomy root node. A namespace is a node of type cq:Tag whose parent is not a cq:Tag node type.

All tags have a namespace. If no namespace is specified, the tag is assigned to the default namespace, which is TagID default with the title Standard Tags, that is, /content/cq:tags/default.

Container Tags

A container tag is a node of type cq:Tag containing any number and type of child nodes, which makes it possible to enhance the tag model with custom metadata.

Furthermore, container tags (or super tags) in a taxonomy serve as the subsumption of all subtags. For example, content tagged with fruit/apple is considered to be tagged with fruit as well. That is, searching for content tagged with fruit would also find the content tagged with fruit/apple.

Resolving TagIDs

If the TagID contains a colon (:), the colon separates the namespace from the tag or subtaxonomy, which is further separated with slashes (/). If the TagID does not have a colon, the default namespace is implied.

The standard and only location of tags is below /content/cq:tags.

Tag referencing non-existing paths or paths that do not point to a cq:Tag node are considered invalid and are ignored.

The following table shows some sample TagIDs, their elements, and how the TagID resolves to an absolute path in the repository:

TagID

Namespace

Local ID

Container Tags

Leaf Tag

Repository Absolute Tag Path

dam:fruit/apple/braeburn

dam

fruit/apple/braeburn

fruit, apple

braeburn

/content/cq:tags/dam/fruit/apple/braeburn

color/red

default

color/red

color

red

/content/cq:tags/default/color/red

sky

default

sky

None

sky

/content/cq:tags/default/sky

dam:

dam

None

None, the namespace

/content/cq:tags/dam

/content/cq:tags/category/car

category

car

/content/cq:tags/category/car

Localization of Tag Title

When the tag includes the optional title string ( jcr:title), it is possible to localize the title for display by adding the property jcr:title.<locale>.

For more details, see the following documents:

Tags in Different Languages, which describes use of the APIs
Managing Tags in Different Languages, which describes use of the tagging console

Access Control

Tags exist as nodes in the repository under the taxonomy root node. Allowing or denying authors and site visitors to create tags in a given namespace can be achieved by setting appropriate ACLs in the repository.

Also, denying read permissions for certain tags or namespaces controls the ability to apply tags to specific content.

A typical practice includes:

Allowing the tag-administrators group/role write access to all namespaces (add/modify under /content/cq:tags). This group comes with AEM out-of-the-box.
Allowing users/authors read access to all the namespaces that should be readable to them (mostly all).
Allowing users/authors write access to those namespaces where tags should be freely definable by users/authors (add a node under /content/cq:tags/some_namespace)

Taggable Content : cq:Taggable Mixin

For application developers to attach tagging to a content type, the node’s registration (CND) must include the cq:Taggable mixin or the cq:OwnerTaggable mixin.

The cq:OwnerTaggable mixin, which inherits from cq:Taggable, is intended to indicate that the content can be classified by the owner/author. In AEM, it is only an attribute of the cq:PageContent node. The cq:OwnerTaggable mixin is not required by the tagging framework.

NOTE

It is recommended to only enable tags on the top-level node of an aggregated content item (or on its jcr:content node). Examples include:

Pages (cq:Page) where the jcr:contentnode is of type cq:PageContent which includes the cq:Taggable mixin
Assets ( cq:Asset) where the jcr:content/metadata node always has the cq:Taggable mixin

Node Type Notation (CND)

Node type definitions exist in the repository as CND files. The CND notation is defined as part of the Jackrabbit documentation.

The essential definitions for the Node Types included in AEM are as follows:


[cq:Tag] > mix:title, nt:base
    orderable
    - * (undefined) multiple
    - * (undefined)
    + * (nt:base) = cq:Tag version

[cq:Taggable]
    mixin
    - cq:tags (string) multiple

[cq:OwnerTaggable] > cq:Taggable
    mixin

Tagged Content: cq:tags Property

The cq:tags property is a String array used to store one or more TagIDs when they are applied to content by authors or site visitors. The property only has meaning when added to a node which is defined with the [cq:Taggable](#taggable-content-cq-taggable-mixin) mixin.

NOTE

To use AEM tagging functionality, custom developed applications should not define tag properties other than cq:tags.

Moving and Merging Tags

The following is a description of the effects in the repository when moving or merging tags using the tagging console:

When a tag A is moved or merged into tag B under /content/cq:tags:
- Tag A is not deleted and gets a cq:movedTo property.
- Tag B is created (if there was a move) and gets a cq:backlinks property.
cq:movedTo points to tag B.
- This property means that tag A has been moved or merged into tag B. Moving tag B updates this property accordingly. Tag A is thus hidden and is only kept in the repository to resolve tag IDs in content nodes pointing to tag A. The tag garbage collector removes tags like tag A once no more content nodes point to them.
- A special value for the cq:movedTo property is nirvana. It is applied when the tag is deleted but cannot be removed from the repository because there are subtags with a cq:movedTo that must be kept.
NOTE
The cq:movedTo property is only added to the moved or merged tag if either of these conditions are met:
Tag is used in content (meaning that it has a reference) or

Tag has children that have already been moved.
cq:backlinks keeps the references in the other direction. That is, it keeps a list of all the tags that have been moved to or merged with tag B. This is mostly required to keep cq:movedTo properties up to date when tag B is moved/merged/deleted as well or when tag B is activated, in which case all its backlinks tags must be activated as well.
NOTE
The cq:backlinks property is only added to the moved or merged tag if either of these conditions are met:
Tag is used in content (meaning that it has a reference) OR

Tag has children that have already been moved.
Reading a cq:tags property of a content node involves the following resolution:
1. If there is no match under /content/cq:tags, no tag is returned.
2. If the tag has a cq:movedTo property set, the referenced tag ID is followed.
  - This step is repeated as long as the followed tag has a cq:movedTo property.
3. If the followed tag does not have a cq:movedTo property, the tag is read.
To publish the change when a tag has been moved or merged, the cq:Tag node and all its backlinks must be replicated. This is automatically done when the tag is activated in the tag administration console.
Later updates to the page’s cq:tags property automatically clean the old references. This is triggered because resolving a moved tag through the API returns the destination tag, thus providing the destination tag ID.

NOTE

Movement of tags is different from migration of tags.

Tag Migration

Since Adobe Experience Manager 6.4, tags are stored under /content/cq:tags whereas previous versions stored tags under /etc/tags.

Whenever upgrading an AEM system from a version prior to 6.4, tags must be migrated to /content/cq:tags. See Common Repository Restructuring in AEM 6.5 for more information.

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