# Does Ignition have any cross reference? **URL:** \ **Category:** General Discussion\ **Created:** [July 30, 2020, 2:11pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217 "2020-07-30T14:11:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![koziorowski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9dc877/32.png) [@koziorowski](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/koziorowski)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2020, 2:11pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/1 "2020-07-30T14:11:00Z")
Hi Could you please help me to find out what cross reference is available in Ignition? i look around and find …nothing I cannot check how many times and where the tag was used i dont know how many times each template was used i dont know what is the difference between 2 version of the project… ---
**Author:** ![KathyApplebaum](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/kathyapplebaum/32/7261_2.png) [@KathyApplebaum](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/KathyApplebaum)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2020, 7:48pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/2 "2020-07-30T19:48:21Z")
Unfortunately because you can build tag paths on the fly, there’s no way for us to give you a list of where every tag is used. With Ignition 8, if you’ve checked your project into version control it’s really easy to see which resources have changed between versions. Some resources are now stored as text, so for things like scripts you can even see exactly what the change is. ---
**Author:** ![peter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/278dde/32.png) [@peter](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/peter)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2020, 8:13pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/3 "2020-07-30T20:13:40Z")
As per @KathyApplebaum there seems to currently be no cross reference. But a [Tags Cross Reference](https://ideas.inductiveautomation.com/ignition-features-and-ideas/p/tags-cross-reference) feature request does exists, and is marked as being under review. So there maybe hope for the future. ---
**Author:** ![mthornton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@mthornton](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/mthornton)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 3:56pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/4 "2021-02-23T15:56:55Z")
What is needed is a tool that can be used to “scan” an exported project for every reference of every tag in the project. By cross referencing an exported project file, we can get a snapshot in time of all the tags and where they are used. This tool would run on a client computer and would not burden the Ignition server other than the project export. The file output from the tool would give a line for every instance of a tag and where it is used similar to the Find/Replace results. For example, if I have a tag named Input1 that is used in 10 scripts on five screens and one property binding on each of those screens, Input1 would have 55 lines listing each of these instances. The output file should be a csv to allow for sorting in a spread sheet. The output file could be very large depending on tag count and usage but at least we could sort through it in a spreadsheet. A static cross reference is better than no cross reference at all. ---
**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 5:33pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/5 "2021-02-23T17:33:05Z")
Doesn't exist. Handling project resources (as encoded in exports) is astonishingly difficult outside the platform, and rather difficult inside the platform. See this related thread: > [@V7.9.x Version Control Workaround?](http://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/v7-9-x-version-control-workaround/43468/2): > > TL/DR: Not possible for anyone outside IA, and not possible at all if any 3rd party modules generate their own resources. Project files can contain all kinds of serialized resources, with the binary encoding defined by the Ignition module (including 3rd parties) that generated them. Some of the encodings expand to exotic XML with recursively nested binary encodings. All of the encodings depend on the serialization technology chosen by the module author(s). This is still true in v8+ for Visi… Similar to this older, pre-v8 topic: > [@Version Control System for Ignition](http://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/version-control-system-for-ignition/11950): > > Hi guys/Devs, Are there any plans on incorporating a VCS like Git, github on Ignition? OR if I may ask, is there anyone here who can suggest how to control source code like VCS does, or any alternative. Thank you! ---
**Author:** ![mthornton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@mthornton](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/mthornton)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 7:49pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/6 "2021-02-23T19:49:21Z")
OK, so it’s hard if not impossible to cross reference tags on an exported project. Do it in the designer. Most of the coding must be done already with the Find/Replace feature. Automate the Find/Replace to run through every tag and send the results to a text file. Seems simple so what am I missing? Even the ability to copy/paste the results of the Find/Replace would be helpful. I could then trudge through tags and copy/paste the results into a spreadsheet to manually generate a tag cross reference! ---
**Author:** ![paul-griffith](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/paul-griffith/32/37249_2.png) [@paul-griffith](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/paul-griffith)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 9:19pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/7 "2021-02-23T21:19:35Z")
> [@mthornton](#): > > Even the ability to copy/paste the results of the Find/Replace would be helpful Fixed in 8.1.1, for what it's worth. We're aware of the demand for _some_ kind of tag cross-reference tool, and implementing something (exactly what that will be is to-be-determined) is a part of our plans to pay down maintenance debt in Ignition's 8.1 lifecycle. ---
**Author:** ![hpark](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/hpark/32/21222_2.png) [@hpark](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/hpark)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2021, 5:08pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/8 "2021-09-28T17:08:35Z")
Hi, folks! The Inductive Automation software engineering team is looking for users to provide feedback on concept designs pertaining to this topic on cross reference. We would love to schedule some time with our users to get thoughts on the concept! Sign ups are available below: > **[Ignition Designer Feedback Session - User Feedback](https://calendly.com/inductive-automation/user-feedback-session)** > > Hi there! The Inductive Automation software engineering department is looking for users to provide feedback on an upcoming feature concept (Designer Reference Finder and View Explorer Tool).We have sign ups available for the week of October 4th (Oct.... ---
**Author:** ![dick.willis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ea924/32.png) [@dick.willis](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/dick.willis)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2023, 10:10pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/9 "2023-11-21T22:10:07Z")
I'm curious if your team is looking to build something at the Gateway level ... cuz what I'd really like to do is see what is accessing the tag, right now (Historian, Project ABC, Gateway Script XYZ, etc.) We have a tag that is throwing comm errors, and we'd like to completely delete it, if we could be certain that nothing is using it. I understand the earlier replier's concern that since we can build tag-paths dynamically, it's difficult to prove that the code won't read a tag ... but if the Gateway could show that no applications have accessed that tag in the last 30 days, we'd know we are probably safe to remove it. We have a number of undocumented, legacy projects and we are trying to clear out the deadwood. ---
**Author:** ![paul-griffith](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/paul-griffith/32/37249_2.png) [@paul-griffith](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/paul-griffith)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2023, 10:11pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/10 "2023-11-21T22:11:44Z")
Great news for you: > [@Tag Reference Tracker](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/tag-reference-tracker/80999): > > Intro At ICC, we announced that, in the 8.1.34 release, a new tool to identify what resource in Ignition is utilizing different tags would be released; a feature we call the Tag Reference Tracker. The code for this long awaited feature has been merged and will be available in the nightly build starting the morning of 10/26/2023. The [original request for this feature](https://inductiveautomation.canny.io/ignition-features-and-ideas/p/tags-cross-reference) was created a little over 9 years ago and there were multiple variations of what people were looking for this feature to be. We … ---
**Author:** ![dick.willis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ea924/32.png) [@dick.willis](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/dick.willis)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2023, 10:23pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/11 "2023-11-21T22:23:23Z")
Sounds great ... I'm looking at those EarlyAccess pages now ... thx. ---
**Author:** ![mopuru.vijayakumar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@mopuru.vijayakumar](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/mopuru.vijayakumar)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2025, 8:32pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/does-ignition-have-any-cross-reference/37217/12 "2025-07-14T20:32:44Z")
I use "Edit -\> Find/Replace" ; select where to search. It provide the list where is used within the project (windows. scripts, tags based on our selection)