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> I've been hearing this for years, but I've never had the mental model for it. Maybe I just have to try it out. Gmail uses tags rather than folders, nice easy

by remus 5y ago

> I've been hearing this for years, but I've never had the mental model for it. Maybe I just have to try it out. Gmail uses tags rather than folders, nice easy way to have a play if you've already got a google account. Conceptually, I think of it as basically being able to have lots of different hierarchical folder structures applied to a set of objects at the same time. Or to flip it round, a normal folder structure is like using tags but where you are limited to one tag (the folder that holds the object) per object.

thunderbong 5y ago
Not exactly. In Gmail, tags are hierarchical. So, if I have a tag called 'projects', and another tag called 'newproject', the overall tag is 'projects-newproject'. If I try to see everything under 'projects', it'll only show me the ones tagged 'projects' directly, not the ones under 'newproject'.
- joshuamorton 5y ago
  I think what you're seeing is the opposite: tags aren't hierarchical. Tags can be organized hierarchically, for organizational purposes, and you can use rules to ensure that everything tagged "projects-FOO" is also tagged "projects", but the tags as they apply to tagged objects aren't hierarchical.
- maxpro 5y ago
  This is only if you use it hierarchically. No one prevents you from having a tag projects and another tag newproject. Your emails just have both tags assigned and you are good to go
  - dredmorbius 5y ago
    From a document perspective, yes, you're correct. From a tagest perspective, and the discovery affordances, there is a significant difference. Hierarchical tagsets allow you to navigate via tags, affording document discovery by that mechanism. That becomes more significant as you're working with a larger, richer, and more structured tagset.
  - OJFord 5y ago
    Sure, but GP's point (and it's something that annoyed me in Fastmail too) is that if you do have an 'hierarchical tag' - which could be in addition to unrelated tags - you don't get the '<sub-tag> is a <super-tag>' that you might expect. The tags themselves end up in an hierarchy without it affecting the tagged contents.

by remus 5y ago

thunderbong 5y ago

Not exactly. In Gmail, tags are hierarchical. So, if I have a tag called 'projects', and another tag called 'newproject', the overall tag is 'projects-newproject'. If I try to see everything under 'projects', it'll only show me the ones tagged 'projects' directly, not the ones under 'newproject'.

joshuamorton 5y ago
I think what you're seeing is the opposite: tags aren't hierarchical. Tags can be organized hierarchically, for organizational purposes, and you can use rules to ensure that everything tagged "projects-FOO" is also tagged "projects", but the tags as they apply to tagged objects aren't hierarchical.
maxpro 5y ago
This is only if you use it hierarchically. No one prevents you from having a tag projects and another tag newproject. Your emails just have both tags assigned and you are good to go
- dredmorbius 5y ago
  From a document perspective, yes, you're correct. From a tagest perspective, and the discovery affordances, there is a significant difference. Hierarchical tagsets allow you to navigate via tags, affording document discovery by that mechanism. That becomes more significant as you're working with a larger, richer, and more structured tagset.
- OJFord 5y ago
  Sure, but GP's point (and it's something that annoyed me in Fastmail too) is that if you do have an 'hierarchical tag' - which could be in addition to unrelated tags - you don't get the '<sub-tag> is a <super-tag>' that you might expect. The tags themselves end up in an hierarchy without it affecting the tagged contents.