Oh Hungry? Oh Oh Oh, OData! Today Microsoft announced the Open Data Protocol [Read more at odata.org] at the MIX Conference. The Open Data Protocol is an extension of the ATOMPub format. The OData Information can be can be represented in ATOM or JSON Format.
One of the key features of OData is that each element contains a datatype so that the data can be consumed by a number of different platforms including Java, javascript, Python, Ruby, PHP, and .NET without running into type safety issues, or misrepresenting the data in a string format.
The Open Data Protocol complements the new SQL Azure Platform nicely, allowing developers of popular website development languages expose data to their applications with ease. Today’s Keynote at Mix showed the web development world that Microsoft has enabled “Checkbox Driven Development” as SQL Azure allows you to expose an OData representation of your Data with a few simple clicks of a Checkbox, and a series of Drop Down Lists. Of course the term “Checkbox Driven Development” is a joking term by Speaker Doug Purdy, this Solution is a streamlined process, but there is still a lot of work to be done to consume the exposed OData Source.
Microsoft’s Codename “Dallas” uses the OData Protocol to expose the Data as a Service Information. If you want more information about Codename “Dallas” please refer to one of my previous posts named “Synchronizing a Local Database with the Cloud using SQL Azure Sync Framework”.
For Additional Resources please refer to the links below
- OData interoperability with .NET, Java, PHP, iPhone and more
- Mix10 Resources
- Open Data for the Open Web
