{"id":111,"date":"2010-05-26T08:27:21","date_gmt":"2010-05-26T12:27:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dontpapanic.com\/blog\/?p=111"},"modified":"2010-05-26T08:27:21","modified_gmt":"2010-05-26T12:27:21","slug":"using-managed-metadata-in-a-blank-site","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dontpapanic.com\/blog\/?p=111","title":{"rendered":"Using Managed Metadata in a Blank Site"},"content":{"rendered":"

A question came up in last night\u2019s MVP Experts chat about a problem using the Enterprise Metadata and Keywords Settings<\/em> in a Blank site.  We suggested various solutions like not having a Managed Metadata service application configured or the fact that the Enterprise Keywords column is not available for Metadata based navigation.  But the questioner said that his problem was that the link didn\u2019t appear in his document library settings page like it should. For a while that had all of the MVPs stumped because none of us had seen a site that didn\u2019t contain the setting.  I quickly created a new site based on the Blank Site template in my test image and as I expected the link was there.  So I told the questioner that we were all stumped on what might be causing the his problem.  <\/p>\n

The Enterprise Metadata and Keywords Settings link contains two checkboxes.  The first adds a Managed Metadata column called Enterprise Keywords to the document library.  The second adds Enterprise Keywords and other Managed Metadata to your My Site profile.  You can see the two links in the screenshot below.<\/p>\n

\"EnterpriseKeywords\"<\/a> <\/p>\n

The questioner came back later to say that he had found a solution to his problem by activating a hidden Feature that he found in some Blog posts.  The Feature ID he used was \u201c73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\u201d.  I was happy that he found his solution, but decided that some further investigation was warranted to figure out what was happening and why?<\/p>\n

It turns out that the Feature he was activating is Site<\/em> scoped Feature called TaxonomyFieldAdded.  <\/em>The Feature adds two links called Term store management<\/em> and Content type publishing<\/em> to the Site Settings page.  It also adds the Enterprise Metadata and Keywords Settings <\/em>link to the Library Settings page.  There is also a Feature receiver assembly defined to handle events when the feature is installed, activated, deactivated, or uninstalled.  This Feature adds support for Managed metadata field support to an entire site collection.  But since the feature is hidden it leaves us with several questions:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. What normally activates this feature?\n
  2. Why was it active in the Blank site I created but not the one the questioner created?\n
  3. Is it safe to activate the feature manually?\n
  4. Why isn\u2019t the feature activated in a Blank Site? <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

     <\/p>\n

    So I decided to take some time last night after the chat to track down answers to these questions and share them on my blog this morning.<\/p>\n

    What normally activates the TaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature?<\/h2>\n

    The answer to this is pretty straightforward.  There is another feature called TaxonomyFeatureStapler <\/em>that \u201cstaples\u201d the TaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature to most of the site definitions used in SharePoint, including the Global<\/em> site definition.  You can see the Elements file from the feature below.  The one glaring omission from the list is \u201cSTS#1\u201d, which is of course the site definition for a Blank Site.  <\/em><\/p>\n

    \n
    <?<\/span>xml<\/span> version<\/span>=\"1.0\"<\/span> encoding<\/span>=\"utf-8\"<\/span> ?><\/span> 

    <!-- Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. --><\/span>
    <<\/span>Elements<\/span> xmlns<\/span>=\"http:\/\/schemas.microsoft.com\/sharepoint\/\"<\/span>><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"GLOBAL\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"STS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"STS#2\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"MPS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"MPS#1\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"MPS#2\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"MPS#3\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"MPS#4\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"WIKI#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"BLOG#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SGS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"BDR#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"OFFILE#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"OFFILE#1\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSPERS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSMSITE#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSNEWS#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSNHOME#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSSITES#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSREPORTCENTER#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SPSPORTAL#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"SRCHCEN#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>
        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"PROFILES#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

        <<\/span>FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation<\/span> Id<\/span>=\"73EF14B1-13A9-416b-A9B5-ECECA2B0604C\"<\/span> TemplateName<\/span>=\"CMSPUBLISHING#0\"<\/span> \/><\/span>

    <\/<\/span>Elements<\/span>><\/span>
    <\/pre>\n
    <\/div>\n
    Why was it active in my Blank site but not the questioner\u2019s?<\/h2>\n
    After looking at the contents of the TaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature itself and the Feature that staples it to most site definitions the answer to this question is pretty clear.  As a Site<\/em> scoped feature this feature is only activated when creating a top level site for a new site collection.  The questioner had created his Blank site as the root of a new site collection while I had created mine as a sub site in a site collection with a Team site as the root.  So in my site collection the TaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature was activated when I built the root Team site while the questioner never got the Feature by building their root site as a Blank site.<\/p>\n
    Is it safe to activate theTaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature manually?<\/h2>\n
    This question is a little harder to answer, but it would appear that the answer is yes its safe.  There are several points that lead me to believe that it is safe to activate manually:<\/p>\n
      \n
    • The TaxonomyFeatureStapler <\/em>Feature adds it to most of the other site definitions, including the Global template that everything else inherits from.  Its therefore likely that the Feature doesn\u2019t depend on a particular site definition\u2019s capabilities. \n
    • The TaxonomyFieldAdded<\/em> Feature itself is self contained and doesn\u2019t have any additional Feature dependencies.\n
    • The Feature works normally in a sub-site created from the Blank Site template if the root site was created with one of the other \u201cstapled\u201d templates. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
      So it would appear to be safe to activate this hidden feature on any site collection, including those built with a Blank site at the root.  You can use the command line below to activate the feature using STSADM:<\/p>\n
      \n
      STSADM -o activatefeature -n TaxonomyFieldAdded -url <URL of Root Site><\/pre>\n
      <\/div>\n
       <\/pre>\n