How to convert an item to List ?
Hello,
I'm working with ARAS for few years now. I'm sending AML queries and receiving ITEMS back. Every case requires a new method of deciphering the data using getProperty or getPropertyItem calls...
Forum Discussion
Hello,
With the introduction of the RESTful API in 11.0 SP12, you can now get data from Innovator in a JSON format. This JSON can be easily serialized into an object in JavaScript by using the standard JSON.parse() function or in C# by using Newtonsoft's Json.NET library. I think this is the easiest way to handle the data since you can look up properties using code like item.id or item.item_number. However, this does require a bit of a learning curve and might require more significant changes than it's worth.
As a simpler alternative, I think you'd be better suited using a data structure that has a Key-Value pair like a Dictionary as opposed to an array or a list. This will make it easier to both create and look up the data. You can see an example of how to build a Dictionary like this in the sample code below.
// We'll assume a single item has been stored in a variable called myItem
Dictionary<string, string> neutralDict = new Dictionary<string, string>();
// Get the raw XML of the item object and loop through it to get the property names and values
var nd = myItem.node;
foreach (XmlNode child in nd.ChildNodes)
{
neutralDict.Add(child.LocalName, child.InnerText);
}
// We can now easily retrieve our data
string itemConfigId = neutralDict["config_id"];
string itemCreatedOn = neutralDict["created_on"];
This sample code is just intended to show the general idea of mapping an Aras Item into a Dictionary, so it's not intended to handle cases like relationships or item properties.
Chris
Chris,
Thank you very much.
There are two problems with using Dictionary: (1) the returned data is not distinct; (2) the value of the dictionary is sensitive to the data structure. So I have to loop over the dictionary before I know the data structure, so we come back to instance-specific method.
Regards
O
