FMSA and MS Sharepoint

[Philip Sommers]

I have a project where I am trying to integrate Filemaker and Microsoft Sharepoint Services. Has anyone out there tried to do this (successfully or unsuccessfully)?

[Wim Decorte]

Given that FM supports standards such as XML and ODBC, it should work. what is you want to do?

Do you need to program in .NET for this?

[Philip Sommers]

Hi, Wim:

Thanks for your response. Ultimately, we are trying to port all of our databases into a Sharepoint portal (not just our databases, but all of our documentation). I am trying to use a Filemaker back end with Sharepoint Services. Management has told me that if I want to "save" Filemaker on this project, make it go through the portal.

I am having two big problems: (1) Getting Sharepoint and FMSA to coexist on the same server. When Sharepoint works, the WPE doesn't and when WPE is working, Sharepoint doesn't (port conflicts, from what I've read). (2) Also, it seems that most people want to use FMP as a front end. In this case, I want to use a FMP back end and the web part structure that comes with Sharepoint. The trouble is that Sharepoint only supports a limited number of data types without some manipulation.

I am not a .Net programmer, but one of my coworkers is very knowledgeable about .Net. However, I am trying my best not to get into that if I can help it.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

Wim can comment more authoratatively, but I do not think this setup is going to work. SharePoint is one thechnology and FileMaker Server Advanced is quite another.

Steven

[Philip Sommers]

Thanks, Wim and Steven, for your responses.

My .Net coworker thinks that the problem is that the isapi filters for the WPE and Sharepoint don't like each other. From our experimentation, he may be right. If anyone has a way to make this work, I'd love to hear it.

I might be able to do a work-around if we put the WPE on its own virtual server, but I was hoping to not create a lot of extra work for our sysadmins if I could help it.

Thanks again ...

Edited March 14, 2007 by Guest

[Wim Decorte]

There are known problems with the 2 on the same machine. But apart from that, The sharepoint API allows for XML and ODBC so you can use those to exchange data with FMSA.

The coding for this would need to be done on the SharePoint side, so it would be .NET. You co-worker may want to check out www.fmDotNet.org