FMData 5.0.0

FMData

Package	Build Status	MyGet	Nuget
FMData
FMData.Rest
FMData.Rest.Auth.FileMakerCloud
FMData.Xml

There are plenty of ways to consume RESTful APIs from .NET, but the goal of this project is to provide a blended FileMaker-idiomatic and .NET-idiomatic experience for developers consuming data from FileMaker databases in .NET applications.

The project is organized as three packages.

• FMData is the core and it contains the base and abstract classes utilized by the other implementations.
• FMData.Rest is for the Data API and
  • FMData.Rest.Auth.FileMakerCloud is used for authentication to the Data API hosted by FileMaker Cloud
• FMData.Xml is for consuming the legacy Xml/CWP API.

Note: Xml support is experimental, if you need full cwp/xml coverage check out fmDotNet.

If you've found a bug, please submit a bug report. If you have a feature idea, open an issue and consider creating a pull request.

Breaking changes

Version 5 has breaking changes. Please review the changes prior to updating your project.

Version 4 has several breaking changes. Please review the changes prior to updating your project.

Installation

Install via dotnet add or nuget. Stable releases are on NuGet and CI builds are on MyGet.

dotnet add package FMData.Rest

Example Usage

The recommended way to consume this library is using a strongly typed model as follows.

Setting up your model

A model should roughly match a table in your solution. Its accessed via layout.

// use the DataContract attribute to link your model to a layout
[DataContract(Name="NameOfYourLayout")]
public class Model
{
    [DataMember]
    public string Name { get; set; }

    // if your model name does not match use DataMember
    [DataMember(Name="overrideFieldName")] // the internal database field to use
    public string Address { get; set; }

    [DataMember]
    public string SomeContainerField { get; set; }

    // use the ContainerDataFor attribute to map container data to a byte[]
    [ContainerDataFor("SomeContainerField")] // use the name in your C# model
    public byte[] DataForSomeContainerField { get; set; }

    // if your model has properties you don't want mapped use
    [IgnoreDataMember] // to skip mapping of the field
    public string NotNeededField { get; set; }
}

Using IHttpClientFactory

Constructors take an HttpClient and you can setup the DI pipeline in Startup.cs like so for standard use:

services.AddSingleton<FMData.ConnectionInfo>(ci => new FMData.ConnectionInfo
{
    FmsUri = "https://example.com",
    Username = "user",
    Password = "password",
    Database = "FILE_NAME"
});
services.AddHttpClient<IFileMakerApiClient, FileMakerRestClient>();

If you prefer to use a singleton instance of IFileMakerApiClient you have to do a little bit more work in startup. This can improve performance if you're making lots of hits to the Data API over a single request to your application:

services.AddHttpClient(); // setup IHttpClientFactory in the DI container
services.AddSingleton<FMData.ConnectionInfo>(ci => new FMData.ConnectionInfo
{
    FmsUri = "https://example.com",
    Username = "user",
    Password = "password",
    Database = "FILE_NAME"
});
// Keep the FileMaker client as a singleton for speed
services.AddSingleton<IFileMakerApiClient, FileMakerRestClient>(s => {
    var hcf = s.GetRequiredService<IHttpClientFactory>();
    var ci = s.GetRequiredService<ConnectionInfo>();
    return new FileMakerRestClient(hcf.CreateClient(), ci);
});

Behind the scenes, the injected HttpClient is kept alive for the lifetime of the FMData client (rest/xml) and reused throughout. This is useful to manage the lifetime of IFileMakerApiClient as a singleton, since it stores data about FileMaker Data API tokens and reuses them as much as possible. Simply using services.AddHttpClient<IFileMakerApiClient, FileMakerRestClient>(); keeps the lifetime of our similar to that of a 'managed HttpClient' which works for simple scenarios.

Test both approaches in your solution and use what works.

Authentication with FileMaker Cloud

We can use the FileMakerRestClient, when the setup is done. Just create a new ConnectionInfo object and set the required properties:

var conn = new ConnectionInfo();
conn.FmsUri = "https://{NAME}.account.filemaker-cloud.com";
conn.Username = "user@domain.com";
conn.Password = "********";
conn.Database = "Reporting";

Then instantiate the FileMakerRestClient with a FileMakerCloudAuthTokenProvider as follows:

var fm = new FileMakerRestClient(new HttpClient(), new FileMakerCloudAuthTokenProvider(conn));

For a full description of using FileMaker Data API with FileMaker Cloud, see this comment.

Performing a Find

var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
var toFind = new Model { Name = "someName" };
var results = await client.FindAsync(toFind);
// results = IEnumerable<Model> matching with Name field matching "someName" as a FileMaker FindRequest.

Create a new record

var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
var toCreate = new Model { Name = "someName", Address = "123 Main Street" };
var results  = await client.CreateAsync(toCreate);
//  results is an ICreateResponse which indicates success (0/OK or Failure with FMS code/message)

Updating a record

var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
var fileMakerRecordId = 1; // this is the value from the calculation: Get(RecordID)
var toUpdate = new Model { Name = "someName", Address = "123 Main Street" };
var results = await client.EditAsync(fileMakerRecordId, toCreate);
//  results is an IEditResponse which indicates success (0/OK or Failure with FMS code/message)

Find with FileMaker Id Mapping

Note you need to add an int property to the Model public int FileMakerRecordId { get; set; } and provide the Func to the FindAsync method to tell FMData how to map the FileMaker Id returned from the API to your model.

Func<Model, int, object> FMRecordIdMapper = (o, id) => o.FileMakerRecordId = id;
var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
var toFind = new Model { Name = "someName" };
var results = await client.FindAsync(toFind, FMRecordIdMapper);
// results is IEnumerable<Model> matching with Name field matching "someName" as a FileMaker FindRequest.

Alternatively, if you create a calculated field Get(RecordID) and put it on your layout then map it the normal way.

Find and load Container Data

Make sure you use the [ContainerDataFor("NameOfContainer")] attribute along with a byte[] property for processing of your model.

var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
var toFind = new Model { Name = "someName" };
var results = await client.FindAsync(toFind);
await client.ProcessContainers(results);
// results = IEnumerable<Model> matching with Name field matching "someName" as a FileMaker FindRequest.

Insert or Update Container Data

// assume recordId = a FileMaker RecordId mapped using FMIdMapper
// assume containerDataByteArray is a byte array with file contents of some sort
var client = new FileMakerRestClient("server", "fileName", "user", "pass"); // without .fmp12
_client.UpdateContainerAsync(
    "layout",
    recordId,
    "containerFieldName",
    "filename.jpg/png/pdf/etc",
    containerDataByteArray);

Note: In order to create a record with container data two calls must be made. One that creates the actual record ( see above) and one that updates the container field contents.

FileMaker Documentation

Latest Versions

• FileMaker Data API Documentation (FMS19)
• FileMaker Server 19 Custom Web Publishing Guide

Older Versions

• FileMaker Data API Documentation (FMS18)
• FileMaker Server 18 Custom Web Publishing Guide
• FileMaker Data API Documentation (FMS17)
• FileMaker REST API Documentation (FMS16) -- Not Supported by this project.
• FileMaker Server 16 Web Publishing Guide
• FileMaker Server 15 Web Publishing Guide

Versioning

We use Semantic Versioning. Using the Major.Minor.Patch syntax, we attempt to follow the basic rules

1. MAJOR version when you make incompatible API changes,
2. MINOR version when you add functionality in a backwards-compatible manner, and
3. PATCH version when you make backwards-compatible bug fixes.