Beware! Business Data Connectivity is case sensitive for database field names

An unforeseen problem with a major impact was uncovered the other day. We have set up an external content type querying an SQL server database table. During a simple change to this table it was recreated with upper case field names, where it earlier had a mix of lower and upper.

This broke the External content types connected to this table. No external list data could be displayed, no external data columns in lists or libraries could be updated, and no actions (like view profile page) would function.

In SharePoint Designer configuration of operations (here the Read List Operation) it is obvious that the original configuration is not able to update with the 'new' column names. Both new and old formats are visible, but the original configurations are locked in and unavailable.


The only way to solve this problem was to recreate the table with the original column name formats. After doing so everything went back to normal.

Henning

No data displayed in external list due to wildcard filter lacking default value

I have been doing quite a bit of External Content Type work lately. One small thing that threw me off was that though everything seemed OK with the query and setup, my external list would not display data.

The simple solution in my case was that my Wildcard filter set up for the Read List Action needed a '%' in the Default value field under Filter Parameters Configuration. This for a SQL Server connection.