BUS ADM 740 Blog

If your project is leveraging a Web service and you need more data to start out with, here is what you can do:

1) Write code in your device application that calls the addX (X is your thing ... restaurant, task, etc.) of your Web service. Make sure you provide unique IDs!

2) Create a network location (see previous blog) and work directly in the XML. Open your XML file in Visual Studio. Can be a quick way, but also error prone, which may lead to problems in the deserialization of your XML data. Use copy/paste as much as possible.

3) Modify the generateData method in your Web service. Right now it only creates one test item. Simply repeat as much as you like the code that creates the data item, assigns the values, and adds it to the array list. Make sure you provide unique IDs!

        Dim al As New ArrayList()
        Dim da As DataItem()
        Dim di As DataItem

        Try
            'test item (your item may have other attributes!)
            di = New DataItem
            di.ID = "0000" 'provide unique ids
            di.Name = "test"
            di.Value = 1.0
            al.Add(di)

            'another item
            di = New DataItem
            di.ID = "0001"
            di.Name = "test again"
            di.Value = 1.0
            al.Add(di)

            '... and so on

            da = al.ToArray(GetType(DataItem))

            Return DataManagementSystem.saveDataItems(da)
        Catch ex As Exception
            Return ex.Message
        End Try

I would use 3 to get started (and reset if necessary) and then work using 2.

MH