SharePoint and Windows Phone 7 Tips and Best Practices

Windows Phone 7 and SharePoint application enable you to create very powerful enterprise collaboration applications, but there are still advanced topics to master. In this unit you will learn how to optimize performance with large data sets. Learn how to look up a SharePoint user’s metadata. Learn how to read list schemas to create dynamic applications that do not require recompilation when a list schema changes. Understand how to implement a pure MVVM pattern. See how to use phone actions to integrate SharePoint data with phone functionality.

Hands-On Labs

  • Integrating SharePoint and Windows Phone 7 in Offline Mode

    Windows Phone 7 applications require network connectivity to work with SharePoint data. Network connectivity is not always available. Windows Phone 7 can use Isolated Storage to persist data on the phone for offline access. Windows Phone 7 applications that require offline access to SharePoint data can work in offline mode when a network connection is not available and work in a connected mode when a network connection is available.

  • Integrating Windows Phone 7 Applications with SharePoint People Data

    Common SharePoint tasks, such as assigning a user to a task in a SharePoint tasks list, require the use of the SharePoint People Web service. The SharePoint People Web service may be used to validate a user account exists, and to return metadata about a user. Developers must understand how to use the SharePoint People Web service to perform these SharePoint tasks in Windows Phone 7 applications.

  • Querying the List Schema for Choice Fields

    SharePoint choice list columns provide the flexibility to add and change the values available to end users. For example a Contact list may contain different types of contacts: Customers, Vendors, Suppliers, Etc. When writing applications that use such a list, it is a best practice to request the list schema and load the list of choices dynamically so that changes to the list do not require recompiling the application.

  • Adding Launchers to E-Mail and Phone Numbers

    SharePoint Contact lists contain fields for E-Mail address and Phone number. When building interactivity into your applications it is desirable to provide users with the ability to tap an E-Mail address to send them a message or tap their phone number to call them. Windows Phone Task Launchers provide interactivity of this sort. Different launchers handle tasks such as dialing the phone, sending an E-Mail message, and sending a SMS Text message.