Taxonomies in SharePoint 2010: No Tower of Babel

Using multiple languages in taxonomies has always presented challenges, but SharePoint 2010 can help ease the pain.

Many companies using SharePoint 2010 conduct business globally and need to make use of a standard taxonomy for multiple languages. But maintaining multiple taxonomies based on different languages and then mapping terms back and forth can be a headache and may require some advanced taxonomy software.

For example, it’s not always a great idea to just create a taxonomy in English and add non-English terms as synonyms. Instead, what’s needed is the ability to create the taxonomy in a preferred language and then add equivalents in other languages. It’s also handy if the taxonomist can simply switch back and forth between languages to add scope notes, term descriptions, etc. in the native language. Basically, it’s the one-stop shopping for all taxonomy needs offered in the SharePoint 2010 Term Store Management feature.

It’s easy to set up the system to handle multiple languages. And once a taxonomy is built in one language, terms can be mapped from other languages. End users can tag their content, like their My Site “Ask Me About” tags, in any language and be confident that searching on the terms will yield relevant results. No matter what the user interface language is, search can be greatly improved by using terms and tags mapped from taxonomies in the Term Store. Cool!

See below for screenshots or view the video to see how it’s done:

1. Add your Working Language(s)

2. Review your term in default (English) language

3. Switch to alternate language (Japanese) and review/update term.

4. Review all terms in Term Set in alternate language (Japanese).