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New Comment on "config file"

amccollough — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 23:04:21 GMT

First time SLAM user. Looking at the .conf file, when there are items like ...List Site="subsite" Name="List"..., are those values "subsite" and "List" placeholders, or do I need to leave them as is?

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 21:28:40 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Latest News
Like SLAM? Try our latest product, SlamCMS. SlamCMS builds on SLAM to provide an entire content management system and application framework that leverages SharePoint 2010 for publishing (using the free Foundation version or the licensed Server) and adds a super-easy, super-flexible way to query and manifest your data built on a set of cutting edge technologies.

Description
Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Version 2.1 for SharePoint 2010 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates in 2.1 include the collapsing of what were the "AWS.SLAM and AWS.SLAM.Core" dlls into a single Slam.dll, the standardizing of SLAM's event receivers to execute synchronously in all cases, the Slam Action framework, which allows developers to attach Pre-Save and Post-Save delegates that will execute within the SLAM pipeline, the new custom-field type control host, the Slam Field, and a few performance enhancements.

Please note that version 2.1 no longer supports SharePoint 2007. If you are still using SharePoint 2007 you will need to use SLAM 2.0

To Upgrade:
SLAM 2.1 contains new assemblies. After updating the WSP solution using Powershell or stsadm, the SLAM Site Collection Feature must be deactivated then activated again. SLAM must then be reactivated via the SLAM Control Panel.

For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

You can either use the discussion tab, or feel free to contact us either using our website form or email us directly at slam@awsystems.com. We actively support SLAM and will continue to be posting more information here in the coming days.

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Documentation

AWSystems — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 21:27:51 GMT

SLAM Architecture

SLAM was designed to be a modular product, and is split into 9 atomic components. All the parts work through dependency injection (DI). Our default implementation of DI uses Structure Map. However, we designed SLAM such that if you have a favorite implementation of DI, you should be able to swap it out pretty painlessly. The goal in this architecture is that any one of these parts can be swapped out if you so desire, so long as you implement the proper methods. The components are:

Data Services
Data Services is the layer that interacts with the external data source. In the default SLAM implementation, it uses connections to a SQL Database. If, for example, you want SLAM to write to an Oracle database or an XML file, this is the layer that you'd change.

Configuration Manager
The configuration manager provides an interface with the config file. It defines what you can get from the configuration. For example, what content types are defined for SLAM and what fields for those content types. It acts as the point of access for all interaction with SLAM.

Down the road, we plan on using the configuration manager to handle programmatic changes to the SLAM config. For the time being, all changes to the SLAM config have to be done manually.

Updater
The updater, quite literally, provides the interface for all updates. When the item updated event handler in SharePoint runs, the "update" method in the updater is called.

In the current implementation of SLAM, Updater then calls Data Services to update items in the external data source.

Deleter
The Deleter provides the interface for all deletions through SLAM. When the item deleted event fires in SharePoint, the "delete" method in the Deleter is called.

In the default implementation of SLAM, the Deleter calls Data Services to delete the item from the external data source.

Creator
Provides the interface for creating things through SLAM. When the item created event handler fires in SharePoint, it calls the "create" method of the Creator.

In the current implementation of SLAM, the creator then calls Data Services to create the item in the external data source.

Data Synchronizer
Responsible for resynching data between SharePoint and the external data source. Currently, it runs on activation of SLAM and whenever there's a need to do a data load from SharePoint to the external data source.

For example, if you have an existing SharePoint site with data that you want to attached SLAM to, you would use the data loader, which will use the data synchronizer layer to perform an initial SLAM of data to the external data source.

Sync Type Processor
Used on sync (see Data Synchronizer). It's passed the types by the Data Synchronizer and processes each type based on its type.

Activator
Called upon during activation and deactivation of the SLAM feature.

On activation, the default behavior is to look at the config, set up appropriate event handlers and attach to the appropriate lists and content types. After all that is complete, it runs the data synchronizer.

On deactivation, it detaches the event handlers.

Logger
Logs messages, errors and events to a log source. By default, it uses two tables in the SLAM database - one for events and the other for messages and errors.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 21:20:40 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 21:17:31 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Latest News
Like SLAM? Try our latest product, SlamCMS. SlamCMS builds on SLAM to provide an entire content management system and application framework that leverages SharePoint 2010 for publishing (using the free Foundation version or the licensed Server) and adds a super-easy, super-flexible way to query and manifest your data built on a set of cutting edge technologies.

Description
Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Version 2.1 for SharePoint 2010 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates in 2.1 include the collapsing of what were the "AWS.SLAM and AWS.SLAM.Core" dlls into a single Slam.dll, the standardizing of SLAM's event receivers to execute synchronously in all cases, the Slam Action framework, which allows developers to attach Pre-Save and Post-Save delegates that will execute within the SLAM pipeline, the new custom-field type control host, the Slam Field, and a few performance enhancements.

To Upgrade:
SLAM 2.1 contains new assemblies. After updating the WSP solution using Powershell or stsadm, the SLAM Site Collection Feature must be deactivated then activated again. SLAM must then be reactivated via the SLAM Control Panel.

For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

brjenkins — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 21:12:05 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Latest News
Like SLAM? Try our latest product, SlamCMS. SlamCMS builds on SLAM to provide an entire content management system and application framework that leverages SharePoint 2010 for publishing (using the free Foundation version or the licensed Server) and adds a super-easy, super-flexible way to query and manifest your data built on a set of cutting edge technologies.

Description
Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Version 2.1 for SharePoint 2010 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates in 2.1 include the collapsing of what were the "AWS.SLAM and AWS.SLAM.Core" dlls into a single Slam.dll, the standardizing of SLAM's event receivers to execute synchronously in all cases, the Slam Action framework, which allows developers to attach Pre-Save and Post-Save delegates that will execute within the SLAM pipeline, the new custom-field type control host, the Slam Field, and a few performance enhancements.

To Upgrade:
SLAM 2.1 contains new assemblies. After updating the WSP solution using Powershell or stsadm, the SLAM Site Collection Feature must be deactivated then activated again. SLAM must then be reactivated via the SLAM Control Panel.

Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 22:43:26 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Latest News
Like SLAM? Try our latest product, SlamCMS. SlamCMS builds on SLAM to provide an entire content management system and application framework that leverages SharePoint 2010 for publishing (using the free Foundation version or the licensed Server) and adds a super-easy, super-flexible way to query and manifest your data built on a set of cutting edge technologies.

Description
Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Version 2.0 for SharePoint 2010 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the option to enable synchronous updating of the SLAM database, the introduction of a new SLAM ID field that can serve as an application-wide non-GUID unique identifier for slammed List Items, the generation of foreign key constraints in the SLAM database, and the provision of location tables. For configuring both new and existing features, see the SLAM Config page for more details.

To Upgrade:
With the release of SLAM 2.0 for SharePoint 2010, a fresh install of SLAM is recommended. SLAM 2.0 adds new features that make significant changes to the generated database such as foreign key constraints and location tables. For this reason, and this being the first "official" release for SharePoint 2010, SLAM 2.0 is a new feature and can be installed side-by-side with previous versions. The recommended path for upgrading then is to create a new SLAM database, copy the existing slam.config, update "AssociatedList" to "AssociatedTypeName" and "AssociationName" to "AssociationTableName" in the new config file, deactivate the old feature, swap the old config for the new config, activate the new feature, then go to SLAM Control Panel to Activate the new version of SLAM.

After activation, SLAM can be synchronized, and the existing data will be saved in the new schema.

Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

New Comment on "Getting Started"

fahadkhan_tech — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 10:37:14 GMT

I confugred SLAM in SHarePOint 2007 but its working on Top Level site and if we configure this on other site collection not on top level site, so it doesn't work. Although I activated Slam feature from Webapplication, Top Level site, Required SiteCollection level everywhere. But its working only on top level site otherwise Event receiver is not occurring. Please suggest Thanks

Updated Wiki: config file

brjenkins — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 23:02:39 GMT

SLAM XML Configuration

By default SLAM uses an XML Configuration file. SLAM looks in the root of the AppDomain, such as a SharePoint virtual directory or an executing location for a console/windows application, in which it is running for a slam.config file. This can be changed by setting the appSetting "AWS.SLAM.ConfigurationManager.Config" to contain a physical path to a specific, valid, SLAM configuration XML file, for example "C:\myslamconfig.xml". A basic SLAM configuration looks something like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Configuration>
  <ConnectionStrings Default="SLAM">
    <add Name="SLAM" ConnectionString="Database=db;Data Source=server;User Id=user;Password=password" />
    <add Name="SLAM_Alternate" ConnectionString="Database=db_alt;Data Source=server;User Id=user;Password=password" />
  </ConnectionStrings>

  <DataMapping DataSchema="SLAM">
    <List Site="subsite" Name="List" ActivationOrder="2">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
        <Field Name="OtherListLookup" Column="OtherListListItemID" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedTypeName="OtherList" Required="true"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </List>
    <List Site="subsite" Name="List" ActivationOrder="1">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </List>
    <ContentType Name="ContentType" ActivationOrder="3">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
        <Field Name="ListLookup" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedTypeName="List" AssociationTableName="ContentTypeToList"></Field>
        <Field Name="Description" Column="Notes" SqlType="varchar(max)" SPType="Note" Required="false"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </ContentType>
  </DataMapping>

  <DataMapping DataSchema="SLAM" SiteCollection="sites/mysecondcollection" ConnectionString="SLAM_Alternate">
    <List Site="subsite" Name="List" ActivationOrder="2">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </List>
  </DataMapping>
</Configuration>

The SLAM configuration contains two main sections, ConnectionStrings and DataMapping.
ConnectionStrings defines those SQL Server connection strings SLAM will use by default. The Default attribute defines precisely that by Name as seen here with "SLAM" being the default connection string.
The DataMappings are the focus of the SLAM configuration however. The Lists and Content Types that SLAM should manage are defined in a DataMapping. For each of these a set of Fields is defined, then each Field that should be mapped from SharePoint to the SLAM database. The example describes the nodes used in the default DataMapping.

With the release of version 1.3 different site collections can synchronize with different databases. Each DataMapping section can specify a ConnectionString to use by name as defined in the ConnectionStrings section. If no ConnectionString attribute is present in the DataMapping node the default connection string is used.

With the release of version 1.2 SLAM works across multiple site collections. The SLAM configuration can have many DataMapping sections which configure Content Types and Lists to be managed by SLAM. Each DataMapping corresponds to a different site collection. If the SiteCollection attribute of a DataMapping element is missing or blank then that DataMapping is used to configure types and fields in the root site collection.

Each node has the following attributes:

List and Content Type
- Name - This is the name of the List or Content Type in SharePoint.
- ID - For Lists, ID is the GUID ID of the list. It is irrelevant for Content Types.
- Site - The Name of the subsite (web), if applicable, in which the List or Content Type exists in SharePoint. This name takes the form like "MySubsite/MysubsubSite". If left out or blank SLAM looks in the Root site (web).
- TableName - This is an optional attribute for giving SLAM an alternative name to give the table it creates for a type. For example, a configuration may define two lists with the same name in different Sites and different IDs to be managed by SLAM. These two lists might need "slammed" to separate tables.
- ActivationOrder - When SLAM is activated, it loads each type according to the ActivationOrder. This order matters due to the manifestation of association foreign key constraints in the database. Types that do not have associations should be processed first, followed by relevant types with already-processed associated types, etc.

Field
- Name - This is the display name or inner name of the Field in SharePoint.
- SqlType - This is the SQL datatype which the field should be stored as. This is used when SLAM is creating database columns.
- SPType - The equivalent of the SPFieldType of the Field in SharePoint.
- Required - Indicates whether SLAM should create the Field's column as allowing nulls or not. This value should correspond with the Field's Required flag in SharePoint. If the Field is an association, when Required is set and AssociationTableName is not set, the foreign key column is constrained.
- AssociationTableName - If an association is to manifest in the SLAM SQL database as an association table, this attribute specifies the name of that table. If AssociatedTypeName is defined but AssociationTableName is missing, the association is saved a column with a foreign key relation to the table corresponding to the AssociatedTypeName.
- AssociatedTypeName - The presence of this attribute defines a Field as one that establishes an association. This is the name of configured Type to which the containing type is being associated by this association field. To SLAM an association, a lookup field, the related List must also be slammed, whether configured by single List or ContentType that would include that List.

With the release of version 2.0 for SharePoint 2010, new options for allowing SLAM to process items synchronously and defining item identifiers. Here is an example of a slam.config utilizing these new features:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Configuration>
	<ConnectionStrings Default="SLAM">
		<add Name="SLAM" ConnectionString="Database=db;Data Source=server;User Id=user;Password=password" />
	</ConnectionStrings>

	<TypeIdDefinitions>
		<add Name="Global" SqlType="varchar(25)" IsPrimaryKey="true" NameFormat="{TableName}ID" ValueFormat="Hex" ReplaceSharePointIds="true" />
		<add Name="GlobalWithSharePointIDs" SqlType="varchar(25)" IsPrimaryKey="true" NameFormat="{TableName}ID" ValueFormat="Hex" ReplaceSharePointIds="false" />
	</TypeIdDefinitions>
	
	<DataMapping DataSchema="SLAM" TypeIdDefinition="Global" SynchronousUpdates="true">
		<List Site="subsite" Name="My List" ActivationOrder="2">
			<Fields>
				<Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
				<Field Name="OtherListLookup" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedTypeName="Other List" Required="true"></Field>
			</Fields>
		</List>
		<List Site="subsite" Name="Other List" ActivationOrder="1">
			<Fields>
				<Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
			</Fields>
		</List>
		<ContentType Name="ContentType" ActivationOrder="3" TypeIdDefinition="GlobalWithSharePointIDs">
			<Fields>
				<Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
				<Field Name="ListLookup" Column="MyListID" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedTypeName="My List" AssociationTableName="ContentTypeToList"></Field>
			</Fields>
		</ContentType>
	</DataMapping>
</Configuration>

The significant differences in this configuration relate to these nodes:

TypeIdDefinitions - TypeIdDefinitions is the section where SLAM IDs can be configured.
- The first example defines the following: the SLAM ID field will manifest in the database as a primary key column called {TypeName}ID, like OtherListID, with a datatype of varchar(25), it will "replace" the SharePoint IDs such that ListItemID and ListRelativeID will not be slammed when types using this ID are saved, and the values of the column will be hexadecimal numbers.
- The second example is just like the first example except the "SLAM ID" column does not "replace" the SharePoint ID columns. Because it is still set as the Primary Key, the {TypeName}ID column will be a primary key, but ListItemID and ListRelativeID will be slammed when types using this ID are saved.

DataMapping additions
- SynchronousUpdates - When present and set to True, upon activation SLAM will provision a SLAM ID field for all configured types in the DataMapping that do not themselves contain the attribute and value SynchronousUpdates="False", and the SLAM process will be performed by the SLAM ID field.
- TypeIdDefinition - When present and set to the name of a TypeIdDefinition defined in the TypeIdDefinitions section, that mapped TypeIdDefinition will apply to configured types in the DataMapping that do not themselves contain the attribute TypeIdDefinition.

Updated Wiki: Home

brjenkins — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 22:34:45 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Version 2.0 for SharePoint 2010 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the option to enable synchronous updating of the SLAM database, the introduction of a new SLAM ID field that can serve as an application-wide non-GUID unique identifier for slammed List Items, the generation of foreign key constraints in the SLAM database, and the provision of location tables. For configuring both new and existing features, see the SLAM Config page for more details.

To Upgrade:
With the release of SLAM 2.0 for SharePoint 2010, a fresh install of SLAM is recommended. SLAM 2.0 adds new features that make significant changes to the generated database such as foreign key constraints and location tables. For this reason, and this being the first "official" release for SharePoint 2010, SLAM 2.0 is a new feature and can be installed side-by-side with previous versions. The recommended path for upgrading then is to create a new SLAM database, copy the existing slam.config, update "AssociatedList" to "AssociatedTypeName" and "AssociationName" to "AssociationTableName" in the new config file, deactivate the old feature, swap the old config for the new config, activate the new feature, then go to SLAM Control Panel to Activate the new version of SLAM.

After activation, SLAM can be synchronized, and the existing data will be saved in the new schema.

Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

New Comment on "config file"

Autogen — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 14:03:05 GMT

Great tool, but guys... please specify all possible config switches. I've just spent an amazing hour trying to figure out why event recievers don't update database with changes made to list. DataMapping element might also contain SiteCollection attribute which should be used in case site collection is not located at the root of url=)))

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Mon, 03 May 2010 21:17:24 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Read our Illustrated Guide to SLAM for more information on what SLAM is and how to start using it.

View our Intro to SLAM movie for a brief introduction to what SLAM is, how to use SLAM and a look at the first SLAM add-on, hierarchy.

Version 1.3 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the ability to set up Data Mappings to use different connection strings to allow different site collections to slam to different databases. You can specify which site collection will SLAM to which database within the SLAM Config, see the SLAM Config page for more details. In addition, SLAM will now automatically create columns to existing tables when SLAM is reactivated.

To Upgrade:
If upgrading from 1.2, just run the SLAM 1.3 Setup. If upgrading from a previous version, run the 1.3 setup and then Reactive SLAM by navigating to the SLAM Control Panel > Activation > Activate.

Previous major features (as of 1.2): multiple site collection support, inheritance and the hierarchy add-on. Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Mon, 03 May 2010 21:16:11 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Read our Illustrated Guide to SLAM for more information on what SLAM is and how to start using it.

View our Intro to SLAM movie for a brief introduction to what SLAM is, how to use SLAM and a look at the first SLAM add-on, hierarchy.

Version 1.3 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the ability to set up Data Mappings to use different connection strings to allow different site collections to slam to different databases. You can specify which site collection will SLAM to which database within the SLAM Config, see the SLAM Config page for more details. In addition, SLAM will now automatically create columns to existing tables when SLAM is reactivated.

To Upgrade:
If upgrading from 1.2, just run the SLAM 1.3 Setup. If upgrading from a previous version, run the 1.3 setup and then Reactive SLAM by navigating to the SLAM Control Panel > Activation > Activate.

Previous major features (as of 1.2): multiple site collection support, inheritance and the hierarchy add-on. Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Mon, 03 May 2010 21:15:10 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Read our Illustrated Guide to SLAM for more information on what SLAM is and how to start using it.

View our Intro to SLAM movie for a brief introduction to what SLAM is, how to use SLAM and a look at the first SLAM add-on, hierarchy.

Version 1.3 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the ability to set up Data Mappings to use different connection strings to allow different site collections to slam to different databases. You can specify which site collection will SLAM to which database within the SLAM Config, see the SLAM Config page for more details. In addition, SLAM will now automatically create columns to existing tables when SLAM is reactivated.

To Upgrade:
If upgrading from 1.2, just run the SLAM 1.3 Setup. If upgrading from a previous version, run the 1.3 setup and then Reactive SLAM by navigating to the SLAM Control Panel > Activation > Activate.

Previous major features (as of 1.2): multiple site collection support, inheritance and the hierarchy add-on. Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

For more information on the general architecture of SLAM, click here

We have a set of API Documentation available here. There's a lot of good stuff there and more will be added as we find time. In the mean time, contact us if you have questions.

Note that you can set up SLAM and use it without ever looking at the API documentation. We provide it for those that are interested in extending the platform, or are just curious as to how it works.

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: Home

AWSystems — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 19:40:21 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Read our Illustrated Guide to SLAM for more information on what SLAM is and how to start using it.

View our Intro to SLAM movie for a brief introduction to what SLAM is, how to use SLAM and a look at the first SLAM add-on, hierarchy.

Version 1.3 is now the latest version of SLAM. Major updates include the ability to set up Data Mappings to use different connection strings to allow different site collections to slam to different databases. You can specify which site collection will SLAM to which database within the SLAM Config, see the SLAM Config page for more details. In addition, SLAM will now automatically create columns to existing tables when SLAM is reactivated.

To Upgrade:
If upgrading from 1.2, just run the SLAM 1.3 Setup. If upgrading from a previous version, run the 1.3 setup and then Reactive SLAM by navigating to the SLAM Control Panel > Activation > Activate.

Previous major features (as of 1.2): multiple site collection support, inheritance and the hierarchy add-on. Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.

Updated Wiki: config file

brjenkins — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 19:33:33 GMT

SLAM XML Configuration

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Configuration>
  <ConnectionStrings Default="SLAM">
    <add Name="SLAM" ConnectionString="Database=db;Data Source=server;User Id=user;Password=password" />
    <add Name="SLAM_Alternate" ConnectionString="Database=db_alt;Data Source=server;User Id=user;Password=password" />
  </ConnectionStrings>

  <DataMapping DataSchema="SLAM">
    <List Site="subsite" Name="List" ActivationOrder="1">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
        <Field Name="OtherListLookup" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedList="OtherList" AssociationName="ListToOtherList"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </List>
    <ContentType Name="ContentType" ActivationOrder="2">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
        <Field Name="ListLookup" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedList="List" AssociationName="ContentTypeToList"></Field>
        <Field Name="Description" Column="Notes" SqlType="varchar(max)" SPType="Note" Required="false"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </ContentType>
  </DataMapping>

  <DataMapping DataSchema="SLAM" SiteCollection="sites/mysecondcollection" ConnectionString="SLAM_Alternate">
    <List Site="subsite" Name="List" ActivationOrder="2">
      <Fields>
        <Field Name="Title" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>
        <Field Name="OtherListLookup" SPType="Lookup" AssociatedList="OtherList" AssociationName="ListToOtherList"></Field>
      </Fields>
    </List>
  </DataMapping>
</Configuration>

List and Content Type
- Name - This is the name of the List or Content Type in SharePoint.
- ID - For Lists, ID is the GUID ID of the list. It is irrelevant for Content Types.
- Site - The Name of the subsite (web), if applicable, in which the List or Content Type exists in SharePoint. This name takes the form like "MySubsite/MysubsubSite". If left out or blank SLAM looks in the Root site (web).
- TableName - This is an optional attribute for giving SLAM an alternative name to give the table it creates for a type. For example, a configuration may define two lists with the same name in different Sites and different IDs to be managed by SLAM. These two lists might need "slammed" to separate tables.
- ActivationOrder - When SLAM is activated, it loads each type according to the ActivationOrder. If order does not matter, this can be the same value for each type.

Field
- Name - This is the display name or inner name of the Field in SharePoint.
- SqlType - This is the SQL datatype which the field should be stored as. This is used when SLAM is creating database columns.
- SPType - The equivalent of the SPFieldType of the Field in SharePoint.
- Required - Indicates whether SLAM should create the Field's column as allowing nulls or not. This value should correspond with the Field's Required flag in SharePoint.
- AssociationName - The presence of this attribute defines a Field as one that establishes an association. This is the name given to that association.
- AssociatedList - This is the name of List, treated as a "type name", to which the containing type is being associated by this association field.

Updated Wiki: Getting Started

AWSystems — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:02:42 GMT

Illustrated Guide to SLAM

This page acts both as an overview of what SLAM does and how to install it. If you want to skip to the install portion click here

What SLAM Does

The best way to demonstrate SLAM is a simple example. Let’s say you have three lists on your SharePoint site: Clients, Projects and Tasks.

Each Project is tied to a Client and each Task is tied to a Project. Each task has a time estimate tied to it.

Now let’s say you want a report showing the total estimated time for each client, aggregating across all projects for that client and all tasks for each of those projects:

SharePoint would require you to iterate through every client, project and task each time you want to build that report. For a short list like this, probably not an incredible problem, but you can imagine what would happen on large lists.

Enter SLAM. With SLAM you just need to describe the relationships and it will “slam” the data to this automatically built SQL database:

Now the report becomes a simple SQL query:

How to Install and Configure SLAM

Before starting, make sure that the .NET Framework 3.5 SP 1 is installed on your server. Download it here.

Begin by downloading the latest version of SLAM from the Releases tab (This guide applies to v1.1.6 and higher. If you're using a previous version please download the latest release from the releases tab before continuing). You’ll receive a WSP an EXE and a REG file (RegisterEventSource.reg). Run that REG file. Next, run the EXE:

Go through the installer. You’ll be asked to select the site collection you want to attach SLAM to – simply select the correct SharePoint instance.

Once complete, go to your site collections features. You should see SLAM listed there:

Activate SLAM.

Before going further, let’s use this opportunity to create an external database for SLAM if you haven’t already (note that out of the box, SLAM is set up to use a SQL Server database). Don’t worry about creating any tables – SLAM does that all for you. The database user should be set to have db_owner and db_securityadmin roles for that database. At the very least this user needs permissions to create schemas, create tables, select/insert/delete/update anything in the database if using roles is not possible or desirable.

Once you have the database set up, let’s tackle the config file. SLAM comes with a skeleton of the config file, which should help you to fully flesh it out. This is dropped in the virtual directory of each web application where SLAM is installed under /resources. Copy the slam.dummy.config into the root of the SharePoint virtual directory and rename it slam.config.

Here’s our slam.config after we filled it out for this example –

For more information on setting up your config file, click here.

Note that we changed the connection string details to protect the innocent. Make sure your values are valid for the database you set up. If you still haven’t set it up, no more stalling, we need it for this step.

Now go to the SLAM Control Panel. You can find it in the Site Setting screen, in the Site collection Administration column

You should see the SLAM Control panel now.

The SLAM Control has a few very useful functions, organized into three broad sections. "Diagnostics" shows the messages logged by SLAM (including error messages if any). "Configuration" provides tools to help validate your slam.config file. "Activation" allows you to attached the SLAM event handlers (or detach them if you so choose) as well as performing a data-synchronization step.

If you haven't moved the slam.config into place yet you also see a welcome message in your control panel home page, telling you that you have to move the slam.config into place.

Since SLAM hasn't been attached to our lists yet, Diagnostics won't contain any data. So let's go to "Configuration".

Currently, there's just one Configuration option available - validate. As SLAM continues to mature as a product, we plan on including some more configuration tools in this area. But in the meantime, let's click "Validate".

If you run into errors, the control panel should be able to guide you on where to look. Keep editing the slam.config as necessary and clicking on “Refresh” until all the types and fields are properly matched.

Once everything looks good, click Back to get back to the Control Panel Home page.

Now click on the Activation button.

This brings us to the Activation section of the SLAM Control panel. From here we can attached the SLAM event handlers, detach them, or resync the SLAM data. resync is necessary if you have data already in your SharePoint lists before attaching SLAM. By default, these items won't be placed into the SLAM database. However, if you want them to be SLAMed, simply Synchronize and that data will be SLAMed.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves! First we need to activate SLAM. Click on Activate.

This will attach the event handlers and bring you to the diagnostic area, showing you the results of the activation procedure -

SLAM has attached itself to the specified lists and/or content types and will build the database and continuously keep it synchronized with SharePoint. This gives us an easy way to verify that SLAM is properly hooked up, just take a quick look at your SLAM database -

You can see that we now have some tables in that database. If you have some tables in the database, everything should be all set, SLAM is up and running!

Now, back to that report –

Simple! Just a touch of SQL and you’re done:

Happy SLAMing!

New Comment on "config file"

davelee212 — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:53:00 GMT

I think I can answer this one... Some of the internal field names in SharePoint will have codes in. For instance, spaces are replaced with "_x0020_" so a field called "My First Toy" is referenced internally as "My_x0020_First_x0020_Toy". Internal field names in SharePoint also have a limit of 32 characters so they can get truncated. You use the COLUMN attribute to specify an alternative, more friendly, name to be used in the SQL table. In the example above, you could use COLUMN="MyFirstToy" to make the column name in SQL a little more friendly. In this case the line would look like: <Field Name="My_x0020_First_x0020_Toy" Column="MyFirstToy" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field>

New Comment on "config file"

realB12 — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 05:44:26 GMT

In some examples in the Discussion board there is an additional Field Attribute "Column" used as follows: <Fields> <Field Name="Account" Column="UserName" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="true"></Field> <Field Name="Title" Column="Name" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="false"></Field> <Field Name="E-Mail" Column="E-Mail" SqlType="varchar(255)" SPType="Text" Required="false"></Field> </Fields> Is this some kind of internal stuff or is "Column" missing in the description above ? When yes - what is the meaning of "Column" ?

Updated Wiki: Home

awellenstein — Mon, 04 May 2009 14:00:28 GMT

SLAM! SharePoint List Association Manager

Most developers who have used SharePoint as an application development framework have run into the realization that SharePoint is NOT a relational database. In fact, the accepted wisdom is if you need relational tables, use ASP.NET/SQL straight-up, not SharePoint.

Enter SharePoint List Association Manager (SLAM). In short it allows you to define relationships (one to one, one to many, many to many) between SharePoint lists (or Content Types) and then leverage those relationships in webparts or custom field types using familiar and straight forward SQL queries.

Read our Illustrated Guide to SLAM for more information on what SLAM is and how to start using it.

View our Intro to SLAM movie for a brief introduction to what SLAM is, how to use SLAM and a look at the first SLAM add-on, hierarchy.

Version 1.2 has significant improvements including working across multiple site collections. You can specify which site collections in the SLAM Config, see the SLAM Config page for more details. In addition, SLAM will now follow inheritance. So if you have a base content type and content types inheriting from it, SLAMing the base content type will automatically SLAM all of it's children.

To Upgrade:
If upgrading, run the SLAM 1.2 Setup then Reactive SLAM by navigating to the SLAM Control Panel > Activation > Activate. If using Hierarchy run the updated Setup also in the v1.2 release.

Previous major features (as of 1.1.6): hierarchy add-on. Read our Hierarchy page for more info on what hierarchy does and how to start using it. For the latest SLAM news follow us on twitter.

Documentation

Need help? Have questions?

Not a Developer? Still interested in using SLAM?

SLAM, in its current form, is aimed as a tool for developers. However, if you're interested in implementing SLAM and you aren't a developer please let us know!

Follow us!

For the latest news and updates to SLAM, follow us on twitter.