Disambiguation

General

The term "Tag" is ambiguous in the context of data management, It refers to any marking that will make that data easier to cross reference. Commonly it is reserved for keywords that are added to / or coupled with the data.

Images

In the scope of images, Tags most commonly refers to the Exif field "keywords". It can be used in a more general way such as "the images exif tags" meaning all of the data stored in the header of the file.

Tag (verb)

to Tag something is to add information about the data, in a way that describes or references that data. In Images this normally means adding keywords to an image, or taking the time to highlight regions of an image with descriptions, names or labels (flickr, Facebook, or FotoNotes style)

Notes

The rest of this page will be used to keep ideas and suggestions on ways to integrate, implement and manage complex tagging. Complex meaning any tagging that goes beyond the abilities of Exif keywords.

references

•  Microsoft people tagging Microsoft's approach to including ImageRegionTags in the XMP section of an image file, as well as linking this to an individual's identity.
•  Fotonotes - the first well accepted method of storing ImageRegionTags in the image, rather than in a database
•  jQuery Photo Tagger - an interface to create ImageRegionTags, well tested, and implemented, but no in image storage.
•  Article - making a strong argument for changes in the way data/images are tagged
•  Flickr API - a programmical interface into the flickr database. This may give insight as to how they store ImageRegionTags and PeopleTags , Though they give credit to  Fotonotes for the idea.
•  Image Maps may also provide some idea of how to store such data. It provides the added bonus of being a proven standard, and having a lot of scripts to "pretty up" its functionality.
•  CSS Display Method of highlighting regions of a photo on an webpage.
•  http://www.kryogenix.org/code/browser/annimg/annimg.html
•  http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/fototagger-%E2%80%93-easily-tag-photos-with-this-free-annotation-tool-win-xp/

See Also: ImageRegionTags , PeopleTags