How to create a cascading drop down list using Managed Metadata
There are many use for Managed Metadata but one thing that the Managed Metadata Service provides is to create a cascading dropdown list. This was a very common piece of functionality that clients asked for in SharePoint 2007 which we can do.
Various Managed Metadata Option
Now this is all good but we actually don’t want the user to be able to choose the ‘Camcorders’ option. It’s really there as a first level of a cascading list. By default when creating Managed Metadata they can so how do you make this term read only so our Managed Metadata list functions more like a cascading drop down list?
Well its quite easy actually. If we go to the term you have the option to not make it available for tagging as seen below what you will get is that the particular term cannot be chose and as long as you set it up properly you can quickly and easily create cascading drop downs.
So for our example we are going into the term set in the Managed Metadata Service and simply mark it as unavailable for tagging as seen below:
Make the term unavailable for tagging
Now you see that the term is grey, indicating that it is unavailable for tagging. If we go back to our list we can see that Camcorders is unavailable but all the terms beneath it are!
Cannot choose the camcorders option!
So put simply make sure that the options for the cascading drop down list that represent a heirachy are not available and you have yourself nifty way to create a cascading drop down list!
Category: How To
