# Multi-select "Change Tags" breaks stuff
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727
**Category:** Feature
**Created:** [May 5, 2016, 12:59pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727 "2016-05-05T12:59:08Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@downey](https://meta.discourse.org/u/downey)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 12:59pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/1 "2016-05-05T12:59:08Z")
Let’s say I want to add tag **Y** to every topic that is already tagged **X**. But some topics with tag **X** have other tags, **A** , **B** , or **C**.
It seems to me that there’s no way to display a listing of all tag **X** topics, use the Change Tags button, and add that tag **Y** without losing the existing **A** , **B** , or **C** tags on the topics that have them.
1. Can anyone else confirm this, or am I doing something wrong?
2. Can anything be done to fix it? 🙂
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### Author:  [@jomaxro](https://meta.discourse.org/u/jomaxro)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 5:39pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/2 "2016-05-05T17:39:40Z")
This has come up before…you’re looking for “append tags”, not change tags. Let me see if I can find the previous discussion.
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### Author:  [@cpradio](https://meta.discourse.org/u/cpradio)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 5:41pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/3 "2016-05-05T17:41:40Z")
Found it
> [@Bulk Actions: "Add Tags" in addition to "Change Tags"](https://meta.discourse.org/t/bulk-actions-add-tags-in-addition-to-change-tags/40059):
>
> Today I made the rather sad discovery that the bulk “change tags” feature depicted below actually will set the tags for selected topics to be exactly the same as the tags entered, meaning it will remove any existing tags. Discovery is sad because I accidentally borked 20 or more topic tags because I misunderstood what was going to happen, and there’s no undo. crying_cat_face A fix to this would be to add a new “Add Tags” option to the bulk actions, which would allow the bulk adding of tags to…
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 8:50pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/4 "2016-05-05T20:50:10Z")
Sure I can support a smarter function here that allows you to add tags. Not sure if it should be the same menu item or not though.
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### Author:  [@jomaxro](https://meta.discourse.org/u/jomaxro)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 8:51pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/5 "2016-05-05T20:51:49Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> Not sure if it should be the same menu item or not though.
Please make it a new menu option, or a checkbox to toggle append vs replace. There are use cases for both bulk tagging options.
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### Author:  [@JMichaelTX](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JMichaelTX)
#### Post date: [May 5, 2016, 9:48pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/6 "2016-05-05T21:48:09Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> Sure I can support a smarter function here that allows you to add tags.
Thanks. We can really use that.
I’d prefer it to be listed along with the other Bulk Change options
My suggestion:
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### Author:  [@erlend\_sh](https://meta.discourse.org/u/erlend_sh)
#### Post date: [June 8, 2016, 10:46am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/multi-select-change-tags-breaks-stuff/43727/7 "2016-06-08T10:46:26Z")
> [@Bulk Actions: "Add Tags" in addition to "Change Tags"](https://meta.discourse.org/t/bulk-actions-add-tags-in-addition-to-change-tags/40059):
>
> Today I made the rather sad discovery that the bulk “change tags” feature depicted below actually will set the tags for selected topics to be exactly the same as the tags entered, meaning it will remove any existing tags. Discovery is sad because I accidentally borked 20 or more topic tags because I misunderstood what was going to happen, and there’s no undo. crying_cat_face A fix to this would be to add a new “Add Tags” option to the bulk actions, which would allow the bulk adding of tags to…