How to Consume OData Service in LightSwitch 2012

What is OData? OData is a standardized protocol for creating and consuming data APIs. OData builds on core protocols like HTTP and commonly accepted methodologies like REST. The result is a uniform way to expose full-featured data APIs. For more info read http://www.odata.org/.

Getting Started

  1. Open Visual Studio 2012.
  2. Go to "File" => "New" => "Project..."
  3. Select "LightSwitch" in installed templates.
  4. Select "LightSwitch Application (Visual C#)".
  5. Enter the Name and choose the location.
  6. Click "OK".

Now click on "Attach to external Data Source" and select ODataService and click the "Next" button.

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Image 1.

Now enter the connection information and specify the OData service endpoint and click the "Next" button.

img2.jpg
Image 2.

Right now I am using a default OData service.

<service xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:app="http://www.w3.org/2007/app" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2007/app"xml:base="http://services.odata.org/OData/OData.svc/">
<workspace>
<atom:title>Default</atom:title>
<collection href="Products">
<atom:title>Products</atom:title>
</collection>
<collection href="Categories">
<atom:title>Categories</atom:title>
</collection>
<collection href="Suppliers">
<atom:title>Suppliers</atom:title>
</collection>
</workspace>
</service>

Now choose your entities and click "Finish".

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Image 3.

This is the designer:

img4.jpg
Image 4.

Now add a screen and select a service name from the screen data.

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Image 5.

Now finally run the application to see the product list.

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Image 6.


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