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Use the Business Data Web Parts on classic pages

The Business Data Web Parts are designed to work with data from an external list and you can combine these Web Parts in useful ways. For example, you can connect the List and Item Web Parts so that when you select an expense report item in the List Web Part, such as Thursday’s charges, the item details are displayed in the Item Web Part, such as the hotel, travel, and meal charges.

For more information, see Create Associations in SharePoint Designer, Business Data Web Parts (Demo), and Find content about external data.

In this article

Overview of the Business Data Web Parts

The following table briefly summarizes each Business Data Web Part.

Web Part

Description

Business Data List

Displays a list of items from an external list.

Business Data Item

Displays an item from an external list.

Business Data Actions

Displays an action of an external list.

Business Data Connectivity Filter

Filters the contents of a connected Business Data Web Part by using a list of values from an external list.

Business Data Item Builder

Creates a Business Data item from parameters in a URL query string and provides it to other Business Data Web Parts.

Business Data Related List

Displays a list of child items related to a parent item from an external list. Requires an association.

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Before you begin

Working with external data requires several pre-requisite tasks to enable secure access to the data. The following information can help you plan your next steps. Also, if you experience problems trying to work with external data, this information can help you identify the issue. To access external data, you or an administrator must do the following:

Prepare the external data source    An administrator may need to create an account and provide permissions to the data source to ensure that the right people have access to the data and that the data does not end up in the wrong hands. In an external database, the administrator may also want to create specific tables, views, queries, and so on to limit the results to just what is needed and to help improve performance.

Configure SharePoint services    An administrator must activate Business Connectivity Services (BCS) and the Secure Store Service.

Configure the Secure Store service    An administrator must determine the best access mode for the external data source, create a target application, and set the credentials for the target application.

Configure Business Data Connectivity Services    An administrator must make sure that the user who creates the external content type has permission to the Business Data Connectivity (BDC) metadata store and that appropriate users have access to the external content type on which the external list is based.

Create an external list    A user must create an external list based on the external content type and one or more views of the external list as needed.

Custom properties of the Business Data List Web Part

Business Data List Properties

Property

Description

Type

Enter the External Content Type to display. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the External Content Type exists, and to select a specific External Content Type.

View

Select a view to display.

Note:  It may take a few seconds to see all the views after you have selected an External Content Type.

Display Toolbar

Select or clear this check box to display or hide the toolbar.

Display Animation while loading

Select or clear this check box to animate or not animate the display while loading.

Data View Properties

Property

Description

XSL Editor

Use to enter XSLT source code into a plain text editor. Knowledge of XSLT syntax is required to use this editor. For example, use this property to reformat the Number and Currency columns.

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Custom properties of the Business Data Item Web Part

Business Data Item Properties

Property

Description

Type

Enter the External Content Type to display. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the External Content Type exists, and to select a specific External Content Type.

View

Select a view to display.

Note:  It may take a few seconds to see all the views after you have selected an External Content Type..

Item

Enter the items to display. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the items exist, and to select a specific item. Alternatively, you can rely on a Web Part connection to automatically enter the item value.

Display Animation while loading

Select or clear this check box to animate or not animate the display while loading.

Fields

Select the fields to display and their position in the item list.

Actions

Select an action, that has been previously defined, to display.

Display new actions by default

Select or clear this check box to display new actions by default.

Data View Properties

Property

Description

XSL Editor

Use to enter XSLT source code into a plain text editor. Knowledge of XSLT syntax is required to use this editor. For example, use this property to reformat the Number and Currency columns.

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Custom properties of the Business Data Actions Web Part

Business Data Actions Properties

Property

Description

Type

Enter the External Content Type to use. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the External Content Type exists, and to select a specific External Content Type.

Item

Enter the items to display. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the items exist, and to select a specific item. Alternatively, You can rely on a Web Part connection to automatically enter the item values.

Actions

Select an action, that has been previously defined, to display.

Display new actions by default

Select or clear this check box to display new actions by default.

Style

Select one of the following display styles:

  • Bulleted list

  • List

  • Toolbar

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Custom properties of the Business Data Connectivity Filter Web Part

Filter Properties

Property

Description

Filter Name

Provide a unique and meaningful name for the filter.

External Content Type

Enter the External Content Type to use for the filter values. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the External Content Type exists, and to select a specific External Content Type.

View

Select a view.

Note:  It may take a few seconds to see all the views after you have selected an External Content Type..

Value column

Select a column to use as the filter value.

Description column

Select a column to use as an alternative and more meaningful value to display to the user.

Display list as

Select a way to display the filter from one of the available options.

Advanced Filter Options Properties

Property

Description

Width

Do one of the following to control the width of the Web Part:

  • Enter a specific width measured in pixels.

  • Leave the box empty or enter 0 to auto-size the width.

Require user to choose a value

Select or clear the check box to require a user to choose a value or allow a user to leave the value empty.

Default Value

Enter the item value. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the item exists, and to select a specific item.

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Custom properties of the Business Data Related List Web Part

Business Data Related List Properties

Property

Description

Type

Enter the External Content Type to display. Use the buttons next to the box to check if the External Content Type exists, and to select a specific External Content Type.

Relationship

Select a relationship based on an association that has been previously defined.

Display Toolbar

Select or clear this check box to display or hide the toolbar.

Display Animation while loading

Select or clear this check box to animate or not animate the display while loading.

Data View Properties

Property

Description

XSL Editor

Use to enter XSLT source code into a plain text editor. Knowledge of XSLT syntax is required to use this editor. For example, use this property to reformat the Number and Currency columns.

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Business Data Item Builder Web Part

This Web Part has no custom properties. It creates a Business Data item from parameters in a URL query string and provides it to other Business Data Web Parts. This Web Part is not visible to the user and only visible when the page is in edit mode.

Common properties of the Business Data Web Parts

All Web Parts share a common set of properties that control their appearance, layout, advanced, Ajax options, and miscellaneous characteristics.

Note:  The common Web Part properties that you see in the tool pane may be different from what is documented in this section for several reasons:

  • To see the Advanced section in the tool pane, you must have appropriate permission.

  • For a specific Web Part, a Web Part developer may have chosen not to display one or more of these common properties or may have chosen to create and display additional properties that are not listed below in the Appearance, Layout, and Advanced sections of the tool pane.

Appearance

Property

Description

Title

Specifies the title of the Web Part that appears in the Web Part title bar.

Height

Specifies the height of the Web Part.

Width

Specifies the width of the Web Part.

Chrome State

Specifies whether the entire Web Part appears on the page when a user opens the Web Part Page. By default, the chrome state is set to Normal and the entire Web Part appears. Only the title bar appears when the state is set to Minimized.

Chrome Type

Specifies whether the title bar and border of the Web Part frame are displayed.

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Layout

Property

Description

Hidden

Specifies whether the Web Part is visible when a user opens the Web Part Page. If the check box is selected, the Web Part is visible only when you are designing the page and has the suffix (Hidden) appended to the title.

You can hide a Web Part if you want to use it to provide data to another Web Part through a Web Part connection, but you don't want to display the Web Part.

Direction

Specifies the direction of the text in the Web Part content. For example, Arabic is a right-to-left language; English and most other European languages are left-to-right languages. This setting may not be available for all types of Web Parts.

Zone

Specifies the zone on the Web Part Page where the Web Part is located.

Note:  Zones on the Web Part Page are not listed in the list box when you do not have permission to modify the zone.

Zone Index

Specifies the position of the Web Part in a zone when the zone contains more than one Web Part.

To specify the order, type a positive integer in the text box.

If the Web Parts in the zone are ordered from top to bottom, a value of 1 means that the Web Part appears at the top of the zone. If the Web Parts in the zone are ordered from left to right, a value of 1 means that the Web Part appears on the left of the zone.

For example, when you add a Web Part to an empty zone that is ordered from top to bottom, the Zone Index is 0. When you add a second Web Part to the bottom of the zone, its Zone Index is 1. To move the second Web Part to the top of the zone, type 0, and then type 1 for the first Web Part.

Note:  Each Web Part in the zone must have a unique Zone Index value. Therefore, changing the Zone Index value for the current Web Part can also change the Zone Index value for other Web Parts in the zone.

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Advanced

Property

Description

Allow Minimize

Specifies whether the Web Part can be minimized.

Allow Close

Specifies whether the Web Part can be removed from the Web Part Page.

Allow Hide

Specifies whether the Web Part can be hidden.

Allow Zone Change

Specifies whether the Web Part can be moved to a different zone.

Allow Connections

Specifies whether the Web Part can participate in connections with other Web Parts.

Allow Editing in Personal View

Specifies whether the Web Part properties can be modified in a personal view.

Export Mode

Specifies the level of data that is permitted to be exported for this Web Part. Depending on your configuration, this setting may not be available.

Title URL

Specifies the URL of a file containing additional information about the Web Part. The file is displayed in a separate browser window when you click the Web Part title.

Description

Specifies the ScreenTip that appears when you rest the mouse pointer on the Web Part title or Web Part icon. The value of this property is used when you search for Web Parts by using the Search command on the Find Web Parts menu of the tool pane in the following Web Part galleries: Site, Virtual Server, and Web Part Page.

Help URL

Specifies the location of a file containing Help information about the Web Part. The Help information is displayed in a separate browser window when you click the Help command on the Web Part menu.

Help Mode

Specifies how a browser will display Help content for a Web Part.

Select one of the following:

  • Modal Opens a separate browser window, if the browser has this capability. A user must close the window before returning to the Web page.

  • Modeless Opens a separate browser window, if the browser has this capability. A user does not have to close the window before returning to the Web page. This is the default value.

  • Navigate Opens the Web page in the current browser window.

Note:  Even though custom Microsoft ASP.NET Web Parts support this property, default Help topics open only in a separate browser window.

Catalog Icon Image URL

Specifies the location of a file containing an image to be used as the Web Part icon in the Web Part List. The image size must be 16 by 16 pixels.

Title Icon Image URL

Specifies the location of a file containing an image to be used in the Web Part title bar. The image size must be 16 by 16 pixels.

Import Error Message

Specifies a message that appears if there is a problem importing the Web Part.

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Ajax Options

Note:  The following common properties are only available for the Business Data List and Business Data List Related Web Parts.

Property

Description

Enable Asynchronous Load

Select or clear this check box to load the data asynchronously (You can continue working before all the data loads) or synchronously (The List view displays a "loading" image until the all the data is returned from the server.

Enable Asynchronous Update

Select or clear this check box to enable or disable asynchronous or synchronous behavior for the following operations: sorting, paging, filtering, and refresh.

Show Manual Refresh Button

Select or clear this check box to display or hide a button to manually refresh the List view.

Enable Asynchronous Automatic Refresh

Select or clear this check box to enable or disable automatically refreshing the List view.

Automatic Refreshing Interval (seconds)

Specify the time interval between each automatic refresh operation. The default value is 60 seconds.

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Miscellaneous

Note:  The following common properties are only available for the Business Data List and Business Data Related List Web Parts.

Property

Description

Sample Data

Enter sample data as a valid XML file and with the same structure as the data returned by the data source. A SharePoint compatible editor, such as Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2013, can use the sample XML data specified by this property to render the Data View at design time.

XSL Link

Use to enter XSLT source code into a plain text editor. Knowledge of XSLT syntax is required to use this editor. For example, use this property to reformat the Number and Currency columns.

Enable Data View Caching

Select or clear this check box to cache or not cache the XSL transform as well as the Data Source Control instance.

Data View Caching Time-out (seconds)

Specifies the duration in seconds for clearing the cache. Selecting 0 sets this property to the default value of 86,400 seconds (which is one day).

Send first row to connected Web Parts when page loads

Select or clear this check box to send or not send the first row of data to one or more connected Web Parts when the page loads.

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