Professional Microsoft® SharePoint® Designer 2007

12.3. SharePoint Data Forms

Back in the SharePoint world, you know from chapters 10 and 11 that SharePoint Designer gives you great control over the display of data through the Data View Web Part. You have now also seen that it is capable of creating data entry forms outside of the SharePoint context. Fortunately, you have the capability to create forms within SharePoint as well. Just as the ASP.NET data form control could both display and enter data, the Data View Web Part can also be used for entry. In fact, the Data View Web Part is also known as the Data Form Web Part.

12.3.1. Multimode Data Views

When inserting Data Views, you may have noticed options for single- and multiple-item forms. These allow you to insert views that have editing enabled by default. Figure 12-17 shows the same data source inserted as a multiple-item view, and as a multiple-item form.

Figure 12-17. Figure 12-17

Single-item versions are also available. In addition, a single-item form type called the new item form allows you to have a distinct view for adding items to your data source.

To have usable data forms, the data source must support update-type queries. SharePoint Lists, XML, and SQL data sources support updates by default. Some external data sources (OLEDB) only support insert and update queries if they are enabled in Central Administration.

As mentioned in chapter 3, Central Administration ...