Tags are one of the coolest features I think with Proxmox VE Server. I think this is a powerful visualization tool that definitely helps with daily administration. What are tags?
The tags in Proxmox are simple metadata objects that you can add to virtual machines and LXC containers in your Proxmox VE environment. What do tags look like? Take a look at the below. When you add tags to a VM or LXC container, these appear to the right of the name of the object in the Proxmox inventory. You can see that you can have the same tags on multiple objects or different, and these appear as different colors.
Where do you add tags in Proxmox? It can be easy to miss, but there is a little pencil icon when you click on a virtual machine in Proxmox that allows you to add or edit tags for that object. Here we can see we have the "minus" sign next to the tag which means we can remove them, and we have the "plus" sign to add tags, the "X" which cancels out of the edit, and the check mark which saves new tags or changes made.
Below, we are adding a new tag in Proxmox. As you see it opens the little box which you can type in and then save it once you are finished. You will also have the option to choose from existing tags that have already been created.
Changing the way Proxmox tags look
Editing the look and feel of tags in Proxmox. You can also edit the look and feel of tags in Proxmox by setting tags options. Navigate to Datacenter > Options > Tag Style Override. I like to see the full name of the tag. So, in the "tree shape" dropdown box, you can select "full" to change to the full name:
Helpful things to add as tags
What are some helpful things to add as tags when you add these objects to your virtual machines and lxc containers? Here are just a few of the things that I have found helpful:
- VLAN connected to
- Network/routing, DMZ, etc
- Purpose
- Application associated with
- Production, lab, dev, test, etc
- Container host
- Kubernetes designation
Really, there is no end to the things you can note with tags in Proxmox that can be helpful.
Hopefully, this little quick tip will be helpful for those who may be new to Proxmox and looking for some of the cool ways to note and find their way around Proxmox infrastructure.