How to Connect to SQL Server 2008 Data

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11-03-2011 09:36 AM
KentAnness
New Contributor II
We recently implemented ArcGIS for Sharepoint (2.0) and have a need to display some data that is stored in some SQL Server 2008 data tables. Its obvious how to reference a "list" of data that has been "imported" from an Access DB, but we want to display data directly from our SQL DB. Is there a way to do this or do you have to implement ArcGIS Spatial Data Services (SDS) in order to make this work. You'd think that doing an ODBC connection to any DB would be possible from within Sharepoint. Thanks for any thoughts or guidance!
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5 Replies
RonnieRichards
Occasional Contributor III
I think one primary question would be is the data from SQL Server using a spatial data type?

If no... you might look into the BDC Service which can make external lists from various database platforms. But using this service successfully really depends on which level of SharePoint you are using.

If data redundancy is not an issue the SSIS Integration Services sharepoint adapters can push/pull data from any database into/out of a sharepoint list in an unattended automated fashion.
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KentAnness
New Contributor II
The data we want to leverage is just a standard SQL table that happens to have Lat/Lon values. Our Sharepoint folks did use BDC to connect create the list as it is rendered directly from the SQL table. The problem we're seeing now is that when we try to connect to the BDC rendered list we get the following error:  Geographic Data Not Found �?? No geographic lists found in the specified site. Does the list need to reside in a table specifically setup for spatial data types???
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LeathMuller
New Contributor
If I were to make a guess, I would say the ArcGIS connector is looking for an "ArcGIS Location" field in the lists on whatever SharePoint site it's searching on... as it can't find one, it thinks there are no spatially enabled lists...

I'm not sure if you would be able to create a ArcGIS Location field on a business data connectivity based table though - it seems unlikely... but I haven't tried... 🙂
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nicogis
MVP Frequent Contributor
you can also serialize in json esri format so you can use api client.
See an example http://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=6d28a606369c43fd9a6f929541ae7c93
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ToddBoewe
New Contributor
Is it possible to server spatial data directly out of SQL Server?   I have a shapefile that I have imported into SQL.  I would like to make that available to the Web Part.  How is this process accomplished?
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