Introduction to SharePoint 2010 Business Connectivity Services (BCS)

Introduction to External Lists and Business Connectivity Services with SharePoint 2010 and Visual Studio 2010Presented By: Joshua Carlisle

Email: [email protected]: JoshCarlisleBlog: http://www.sharepointbrainfreeze.com

A little about me

SharePoint Developer – 7 YearsSoftware Developer – 13 yearsUser Group Leader – Triangle SharePoint User Group (Raleigh, NC)User Group and Regional Conference SpeakingBlog: www.sharepointbrainfreeze.comTwitter: JoshCarlisle

OverviewBCS OverviewRole of External Lists, External Content Types, EntitiesTools Support (SPD, Visual Studio 2010)Demos

Short SharePoint DesignerIntroduction to Visual Studio BCS ProjectAdvanced BCS Project

What are Business Connectivity Services?

Builds on SharePoint 2007 BDCIntegration with Backend Data SourceImproved Functionality and Tool SupportUnderlying Framework Now Part of SharePoint Foundation (formerly WSS)

External Content Type (ECT) \ Entities \ External Lists Oh My!

External Content

Type(ECT)

External DataDefinitio

n

BCS

BCS

Thick Clients

Thin Clients (SharePoint)

External Lists

BCS Tools – SPD & Visual Studio

SPD Visual Studio

No Code Solutions

“Simple” Homogeneous Data

Define CRUD Operations

Customize Forms (Infopath)

Define Workflows

Aggregate\Mashup Data

Complex Business Logic

Advanced VSTO Integration

Defined Reusable SPD Parts

Demos

• SharePoint Designer – External Content Type• Visual Studio – Out of the Box• Visual Studio – SQL Database & Twitter Aggregation

Credits:Thanks to Kirk Evan’s article “Using Business Connectivity Services in SharePoint 2010“ on MSDN for some of the inspiration for the twitter integration in my demos.

Feedback and Resources

Feedback and Full Source code for demos can be downloaded from my blog at http://www.sharepointbrainfreeze.com