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ADO.NET Sync Services

Thu, February 21, 2008, 02:15 PM under dotNET | Orcas
With the release of Visual Studio 2008 we also get v1.0 of ADO.NET Synchronization Services that allows you to build Occasionally Connected Applications by allowing synchronization of remote data with a local cache of the data. Sync Services is the first part of the larger framework still in development: Microsoft Sync Framework (MSF). MSF was part of the announcements at Tech Ed Europe 2007. The first CTP of the Sync Framework is available and it includes a pre-release of v2.0 of Sync Services for ADO.NET. Stay tuned on the Sync Framework blog (which includes links to other relevant blogs down the side). I also believe there will be an update near the SQL Server 2008 release, but I am not sure. There is a very useful FAQ on Sync Services on Steve's blog.

To be clear, here I am still talking about v1 of Sync Services, which ships with VS2008 RTM. If you do not have VS2008, you can still get Sync Services by downloading SQL Compact Edition v3.5 (which is what holds the local cache). Included in the download are the 3 assemblies that complete the picture. So you may be thinking: "if I can get it as a standalone download, why use VS2008 and not stick with VS2005?". The answer is that there is a very smart Configure Data Synchronization dialog wizard as part of VS2008 that generates tons of code and also performs other actions that IMO are too tedious for easily using VS2005 with Sync Services. To invoke the wizard in a new VS2008 project (v2.0 or v3.0 or v3.5) right click on the project node and add new item and choose the "Local Data Cache" item template – then just follow your nose (or the documentation and numerous links above ;-))

If you want a quick intro then put 15 minutes aside to watch my screencast introducing the ADO.NET Sync Services. The Visual Studio project that I create in the video can be downloaded here.
Comments [13] |#Permalink
Friday, February 22, 2008 1:34:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
As always, that's just great Daniel! Thanks for this quick kickstart.
Arnaud
Tuesday, February 26, 2008 12:58:44 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
arnaud: "quick kickstart" is my middle name - glad you liked it :-D
Daniel Moth
Monday, March 24, 2008 7:37:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Does the audio work for the screencast? I'm getting the video but wonder if there is an audio part to the screencast.

Thanks!

chris
Anonymous
Monday, March 24, 2008 8:08:37 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Chris: Audio is supposed to work. Does it fail for you for both the streaming video and the download in the ZIP? They are encoded differently so this might help narrow it down to a codec issue on your machine...
Daniel Moth
Monday, March 24, 2008 10:00:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
If it might help, I couldn't hear the audio when watching the screencast with VLC. With Windows Media Player it works fine though. The same was true with the TechEd post-conference DVD (MS wants you to use MS ;-) ).
Arnaud
Monday, March 24, 2008 10:14:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Howdy,

I'm trying to get it to work from the download (although I did try streaming after installing Silverlight but never got anything working on that end). Currently, I'm upgrading from Windows Media Player 10 to 11 (still on XP). I'll repost if that fixes it.
Anonymous
Tuesday, June 03, 2008 4:38:00 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)
I went to the DevDays in Amsterdam. Really liked your session about the 5 VS2008 features!!
I'm having some trouble with the wizard. After i selected the server connection (SQL server Express 2005) the Add button remains disabled. The client is Compact 3.5. I tried the test connection from within the wizard and they do work. Haven't found any errors in my logs.
Any idea why the Add button remains disabled? Thanks!!
Marco
Friday, June 06, 2008 1:07:00 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)
Hi Marco,
The Add button is disabled either during the time the schema is retrieved or when there are no usable schema objects to add.

That is, if I have a database without tables (or tables that I have permissions to), or without tables that have PKs, then effectively there is nothing to add. Hence the button remains disabled.

Best regards,
Milind Lele
PM, Visual Studio
Milind Lele (MSFT)
Thursday, October 30, 2008 9:28:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Great Job Daniel!, its a very useful example. But how it changes or how vs2008 can manage a Smart Client with a SOA Server Side and Enterprise Library 4.0 for security, caching, logging, data access, exceptions. I hope u can help me with that.

Nice videos BTW.

Thanks!

Lois
Anonymous
Wednesday, November 12, 2008 12:23:00 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Hi,

I followed your video but when i change data on both the server and client, my local database cache never gets updated. What can be causing this bug?

thanks!

Rick
Rick Oonk
Saturday, November 15, 2008 8:20:09 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Lois, Rick: Sorry, I cannot help debug your issues or offer further guidance (I have moved on to completely different things). I provided the Hello World and the rest is up to you :-). Please use the links I offered above to contact members of the product team.
Daniel Moth
Tuesday, November 18, 2008 11:50:14 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
All: There is a dedicated forum for this topic:
http://forums.microsoft.com/msdn/ShowForum.aspx?ForumID=1225&SiteID=1
Daniel Moth
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 9:51:00 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)
Thanks a ton....A great compilation of necessary things about ADO.net Sync services. Saved a lot of time for me :)
Anonymous
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