Tag Cloud Fields

A Tag Cloud field is a graphical representation of the values in a list field. The values in the Tag Cloud field are clickable to allow the user to select or de-select them; selected values are highlighted with the color configured in the HIGHLIGHT_COLOR behavior setting. The Tag Cloud field is configured in the following manner:

  • A UDF with a display type of List. This is termed the source list field.This contains the list of values in the tag cloud
  • A UDF with a display type of Custom. The name must start with the same name as the source list field and end in _TAG_CLOUD
  • Optionally, the Default value field in the Data Dictionary entry for the custom field can be configured with the following parameters for rendering the field:
    • height=NNN (default 100)
    • width=NNN (default 900)
    • columns=NNN (default 10)

Multiple parameters must be separated by commas. E.g, height=90,width=800,columns=7 overrides all the default values. You need not spcify all the all parameters. E.g, columns=5 renders list values in five columns with the default height and width.

On the Add or Edit Screen layouts, both the source list field and the Tag Cloud fields must be included, where the source list field must precede the Tag Cloud field in order on the layout, i.e, the Tag Cloud field must be on a row and column higher than the source list field. The Tag Cloud field includes support only for the REMOVE_NONE layout cell attribute, which removes the *None* value from the list of values rendered; all other layout cell attributes configured on the Tag Cloud field are ignored.

Layout Editor Tip: In order to hide the source List field and make only the Tag Cloud field visible to users, configure the source List field with the following layout cell attributes:

  • FIELD ALTERNATIVE TITLE = " " (a blank space; this will replace the original title of the source List field)
  • FIELD STYLE = display:none (this will cause the values drop-down box to be hidden)

This will cause the source list field to be rendered on the screen in a hidden mode, but still be accessible to internal routines that are used to communicate between the source list and Tag Cloud fields. Other layout cell attributes configured on the source List field, such as FIELD REQUIRED, will continue to be enforced. Note that using the FIELD/LAYOUT VISIBLE IF layout cell attribute to hide the source List field will disable the Tag Cloud field functionality.

The Security Permissions configured for the Tag Field affect how the values are rendered: if readonly, then values are displayed as plain text without hyperlinks; if read/write, then values are displayed as hyperlinked text.