How the Tags portlet interacts with the other Connections portlets

This topic describes how the Tags portlet interacts with the other IBM® Connections portlets.

The IBM Connections Tags portlet allows users to locate content in the other IBM Connections portlets (Activities, Blogs, Bookmarks, Forums, Wikis and Profiles). Selecting a tag from the Tags portlet causes the Connections portlets to reload to display the content from the Connections applications that are tagged with the selected tag. This interaction between the Tags portlet and other Connections portlets is enabled through portlet wiring to send the information that the Connections portlets must request the proper feeds filtered by the selected tag.

There are two modes of operation with regards to the interaction between the tags and the other Connections portlets: one-way and two-way communication mode. In one-way communication mode, the Tags portlet sends a wire to the other Connections portlets to update their view according to a selected tag. In two-way communication mode, the other Connections portlets can also send a wire to the Tags portlet to update its view as well according to the view being displayed.

Note: Tags are not supported for Forums or Profiles that are deployed on a community page.

One-way Communication Mode

One-way communication mode is enabled when the Tags portlet is set to communicate with multiple instances of the Connections application portlets. This mode is enabled when more than one application is selected in the Shared Settings panel of the Tags portlet. In this mode, the Tags portlet uses the IBM Connections home page Search API to obtain an aggregated tag feed of the selected applications using the search URL set in the Tags portlet configure panel. To properly configure one-way communication mode for tag filtering, the following items are required:
  1. The application URL of the Connections application you represented in the Tags portlet must be set in the REP provider.
  2. At least two applications that you want represented in the Tags must be selected in the Tags portlet shared settings panel.
  3. The wiring must be configured to send a wire from the Tags portlet to the applications selected in step 2. See Wiring the Tags portlets for instructions on how to set up portlet wiring.

Two-way Communication Mode

Two-way communication mode is enabled when the Tags portlet is set to communicate with a single Connections application portlet. This is enabled when only one application is selected in the Shared Settings panel of the Tags portlet. In this mode, the Tags portlet uses the corresponding application API to obtain the tag feed of the selected application using the application URL set in the Tags portlet configure panel. Like the one-way communication mode, the Tags portlet sends a wire to the Connections application portlet when a tag is selected. In addition, the Connections application portlet sends a wire to the Tags portlet to refresh the tags to show the tags relevant for the view selected. An example of this is when you drill down into an activity from the “My Activities” view in the Activities portlet, a wire is sent to the tags with information to show the tags specific to the activity selected. To properly configure two-way communication mode for tag filtering, the following items are required:
  1. The application URL of the Connections application you represented in the Tags portlet must be set in the REP provider.
  2. The single application that you want represented in the tags must be selected in the Tags portlet shared settings panel.
  3. The wiring must be configured to send a wire from the Tags portlet to the Connections application selected in step 2 and the wiring from the Connections application portlet must be configured to send a wire to the Tags portlet to render tags for the view that is selected in the application portlet. See Wiring the Tags portlets for instructions on how to set up portlet wiring.