The University Library introduces a new tool to make it easier for library web site users to organize, collect, and share information. MTagger is a tagging application. It lets users "tag" library web pages, Mirlyn catalog entries, digital images, or any web page and then share their tag collections with others.

Go directly to MTagger

What Is a Tag?

A tag is a label that you assign to a web page. They are keyword descriptors that help you and other users find similar library items. Most importantly, you choose the tags. You can assign as many tags to an item as you like and rename or delete the tags later. Like bookmarks or favorites in your web browser, tags let you collect and organize web pages you want to save for later use. Unlike bookmarks or favorites, tags are accessible from any computer with an internet connection. If you've ever typed keywords into Flickr or YouTube, labeled friends in a picture on Facebook, or used Gmail labels to organize your email, you've tagged something!

Once you've found a library web page you want to bookmark using MTagger, simply select "MTag This" from the navigation menu. Add your tags - words or phrases that mean something to you - and you're done. You can build collections of web pages, books, or images by tagging them with the same word or phrase (for example, "Greece," "History 103," "biology research," or whatever else makes sense to you). Then, to find everything you've tagged, simply go to MTagger and look through your tag collections.

When you're viewing a library web page or an item in Mirlyn, you can see what tags others have used. Find a tag that you want to explore? Just click it to see all the items that every user has tagged. Find a user with similar research interests? Look at all that user's tagged items.

If you want to simply browse all users' tags, go to the MTagger site and look at the "tag cloud" - a visual representation of everybody's tags. More frequently used tags are shown in larger type. Tags you have used are shown in dark blue; tags other users have applied are light blue.

Sample MTagger Tag Cloud

What You Can Tag

1. Most MLibrary web pages. There is a new MTagger menu item in the standard navigation bar and a tag cloud in the footer of all library web pages that use the MLibrary template, including this one -- look in the upper right for the MTagger menu and the lower left for the tag cloud.
2. Digital image collections hosted by the U-M Library (DLPS). A tag cloud appears on all image description pages. Example.
3. Mirlyn (on item display pages). A tag cloud appears at the bottom of item display pages. Example.
4. Selected electronic journals published by the Scholarly Publishing Office. Example.
5. Any page on the web with the MTagger Browser Bookmark, once you have added it to your browser's bookmarks/favorites toolbar.

To try out MTagger, go to http://www.lib.umich.edu/mtagger.