TaxonomyWebTaggingControl Not Showing Up on Page

Question

I am attempting to use a Taxonomy Picker Control (TaxonomyWebTaggingControl) on an Application Page based on the term set configured for a User Profile property. In this scenario, I have set the Ask Me About field to use a Term Set in the User Profile Service Application. When editing a user profile through the My Site or Central Admin, the field correctly displays as a Taxonomy Picker and allows me to select values from the Term Set.

In a new Application Page, I have registered the tag prefix:

<%@ Register Tagprefix="Taxonomy" Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint.Taxonomy" Assembly="Microsoft.SharePoint.Taxonomy, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>

And in the content I have added the control:

<Taxonomy:TaxonomyWebTaggingControl id="ngAskMeAbout" runat="server" />

In the Page_Load, I am first obtaining the term set from the User Profile property and then using it to get the term set from the Taxonomy Session:

var site = SPContext.Current.Site;
var context = SPServiceContext.GetContext(site);
var configMgr = new UserProfileConfigManager(context);
var propertyMgr = configMgr.ProfilePropertyManager;
var corePropertyMgr = propertyMgr.GetCoreProperties();

var askMeAbout = corePropertyMgr.GetPropertyByName("SPS-Responsibility");

var termSet = askMeAbout.TermSet;

ngAskMeAbout.Disabled = false;
ngAskMeAbout.Enabled = true;
ngAskMeAbout.Visible = true;

var taxonomySession = new TaxonomySession(site);
var termStoreId = termSet.TermStore.Id;
var termGroupId = termSet.Group.Id;
var termSetId = termSet.Id;

ngAskMeAbout.SspId.Add(termStoreId);
ngAskMeAbout.GroupId = termGroupId;
ngAskMeAbout.TermSetId.Add(termSetId);

ngAskMeAbout.AllowFillIn = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsMulti = true;
ngAskMeAbout.IsAddTerms = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsDisplayPickerButton = true;
ngAskMeAbout.IsIncludeTermSetName = true;
ngAskMeAbout.IsUseCommaAsDelimiter = false;
ngAskMeAbout.Language = taxonomySession.TermStores[termStoreId].DefaultLanguage;
ngAskMeAbout.AnchorId = Guid.Empty;
ngAskMeAbout.ExcludeKeyword = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsIgnoreFormatting = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsIncludeDeprecated = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsIncludePathData = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsIncludeUnavailable = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsSpanTermSets = false;
ngAskMeAbout.IsSpanTermStores = false;

When I try running this, nothing renders on the page. I have debugged/stepped through the code to verify all the IDs are getting set properly and nothing generates an error.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

It appears that the Left Navigation control calls a JavaScript function called "HideQuickLaunchMenu()". For whatever reason, that function is undefined when it is called from my application page. And thus it breaks the JavaScript for the taxonomy control. As a remedy for my page, I added a blank function with the same name:

<script type="text/javascript">
    function HideQuickLaunchMenu() {
    }
</script>

Doing this made the taxonomy control work properly again. That function probably exists in one of the SharePoint JavaScript files (not in Core.js or SP.js, checked those), however I was unable to find it. The code above works for me, so I will just go with that.

Answer 2

So, I did end up discovering the cause of the issue, however I think it is more of a bug in SharePoint:

When the solution is deployed as a Web feature to the My Site web, it causes the error to occur. If I change the solution to be a Site feature and deploy it to the My Site Site Collection, the error does not occur.