Why tags convert to lowercase in Q2A?

Question

Is it necessary to convert tags to lowercase? What is this for?

If it prevents from duplicate tags, this can be done when saving tags only with comparing tags in lowercase ro uppercase.

Comments

Maybe whether uppercase tags are allowed should be decided by a check box, like how admins can decide if spaces are allowed in tags?

---

Yes, that will be better. I don't know why we have not such an option now!

---

Related question - http://www.question2answer.org/qa/32984/how-to-prevent-tags-from-being-converted-to-lower-case

---

Version 1.7 can't handle tags as case-sensitive :(

Answer 1

Having to always compare tags in a case-insensitive manner makes things much more complicated in the programming.

It also makes things more inconsistent on the front end too. It's much better to "normalize" tags so they are all follow the same format.

Comments

Yes, but what if we have a tag wish to save in two different cases? or have a tag wish to save in uppercase?
Is it reasonable divesting ourselves of that, to have more simple code?
Dimension10 offer is a good one in my opinion.

---

@Dimension10 and we still don't have this option

---

That's not as simple as that. If tags are case sensitive all plugins operating on tags need change. Moreover MySQL like operator is case insensitive and so that cannot be used for tag comparison.

---

Store and Show tags as case sensitive and at time of comparing convert tags in lowercase.
And i see most plugin always do that before compering tags. Like Tagging Tools by Scott Vivian

---

It's certainly possible. But in the end many wouldn't like tags to be shown as upper case for aesthetic reason itself. So why should effort be put for this. Of course if someone gives a pull request for same with an additional check box to enable this there's no harm in having this in Q2A.