Programatically Manage Remote Documents with the FrontPage RPC Library

We've rolled up some of the ideas in previous posts about FrontPage Server Extensions RPC methods into a free CC licensed c# code library.

You can download the source code along with a demo copy of HubKey's SharePoint Client API from HubKey's website - click here for details.

Documentation about the members exposed through the HubKey.Net.FrontPageRPC.WebClient class can be found online here.

Features of the class include:

• Upload or download many documents in one web request using the 'get documents' and 'put documents' methods.


• True file streaming (without pre-loading to memory) for faster uploads.


• Asynchronous methods including an asynchronous MoveDocuments method.


• Auto detection of FrontPage dll paths and versions.

The following FrontPage Server Extensions RPC Methods are included in the library:

• checkin document method - remotely check-in a document to source control.


• checkout document method - remotely check-out a document from source control.


• getDocsMetaInfo method - download document metadata to a client machine.


• get document method - remotely download a document with metadata from a web folder or SharePoint document library. Includes an asynchronous method.


• get documents method - programatically download documents with metadata from a web folder or SharePoint document library in one web request. Includes an asynchronous method.


• list documents method - obtains a list of files and folders on the web or SharePoint server. Sorts the results into a tree structure to allow for use in a TreeView control.


• list versions method - retrieves metadata for all the versions of the specified document.


• move document method - programatically move (rename) or copy a file or folder. Allows for moves between webs or even servers by downloading and then uploading the file.


• open service method - list service meta information.


• put document method - programatically upload a file to a SharePoint document library or web server with meta info. Includes an asynchronous method.


• put documents method - remotely upload files to a SharePoint document library or web server with meta info. Includes a method to asynchronously upload large files. Allows true streaming (without loading into memory first) for large file uploads.


• remove documents method - delete files or folders from a SharePoint document library or web server.


• setDocsMetaInfo method - update document meta data from a client computer.


• uncheckout document method - revert a document to the version before it was checked out.


• url to web url method - break a url into its web and web relative components.

A very brief code example follows - we'll cover an in depth sample application in a future post:

using System;

using System.Collections.Generic;

using System.Text;

namespace HubKey.Net.FrontPageRPC

{

    class Program

    {

        static void Main(string[] args)

        {

            WebClient webClient = new WebClient();

            //upload a document and check it in

            MetaInfoCollection meta = new MetaInfoCollection();

            meta.Add("vti_title", "My Title");

            UploadDocumentResponse uploadDocumentResponse = webClient.UploadDocument("https://localhost/Docs1/test.txt", @"C:\test.txt", meta);

            if (uploadDocumentResponse.Document.IsCheckedOut)

                webClient.CheckInDocument(uploadDocumentResponse.Document, "uploaded via RPC");

            //move a document between servers

            MoveDocumentResponse moveDocumentResponse = webClient.MoveDocument("http://localhost/Docs2/test.txt", "https://remoteserver/Docs2/test.txt");

        }

    }

}

Upload a File to a SharePoint Document Library - Part II

In Part I I posted code that used the SharePoint lists service to help in uploading files with meta data to a sharepoint document library. Here is another variation, this time using FrontPage Server Extensions and RPC. Note that this code won't create more than one new folder - if this is a problem you may want to ensure the full folder path with code like that from the first article.

Update: You can download a comprehensive c# class library to automate RPC calls - including uploading files to a SharePoint document library. See this blog post for more information.

using System;

using System.Collections.Generic;

using System.Text;

using System.IO;

using System.Net;

using System.Web;

namespace DevHoleDemo

{

    class Program

    {

        static void Main(string[] args)

        {

            Dictionary<string, object> properties = new Dictionary<string, object>();

            properties.Add("Title", "Test Title");

            //Create or overwrite text file test.txt in 'Docs' document library creating folder 'Test Folder' as required.

            DocLibHelper.Upload("http://localhost/Docs/Test Folder/test.txt", System.Text.Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes("Test text."), properties);

        }

    }

    static class DocLibHelper

    {

        static string EncodeMetaInfo(Dictionary<string, object> metaInfo)

        {

            if (metaInfo == null) return "";

            StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();

            foreach (KeyValuePair<string, object> kvp in metaInfo)

            {

                if (kvp.Value != null)

                {

                    string fieldName = kvp.Key; // note: field names are case sensitive

                    switch (fieldName)

                    {

                        case "Title":

                            fieldName = "vti_title";

                            break;

                    }

                    string data = EscapeVectorChars(kvp.Value.ToString());

                    string dataTypeCode = "S";

                    switch (kvp.Value.GetType().FullName)

                    {

                        case "System.Boolean":

                            dataTypeCode = "B";

                            break;

                        case "System.DateTime":

                            data = ((DateTime)kvp.Value).ToString("s") + "Z";

                            break;

                    }

                    sb.AppendFormat("{0};{1}W|{2};", fieldName, dataTypeCode, data);

                }

            }

            return HttpUtility.UrlEncode(sb.ToString().TrimEnd(';'));

        }

        static string EscapeVectorChars(string value)

        {

            StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();

            foreach (char c in value)

            {

                switch (c)

                {

                    case ';':

                    case '|':

                    case '[':

                    case ']':

                    case '\\':

                        sb.Append("\\");

                        break;

                }

                sb.Append(c);

            }

            return sb.ToString();

        }

        public static string GetWebURL(string url)

        {

            try

            {

                url = url.Substring(0, url.LastIndexOf("/"));

                try

                {

                    using (WebClient webClient = new WebClient())

                    {

                        webClient.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials;

                        webClient.Headers.Add("Content-Type", "application/x-vermeer-urlencoded");

                        webClient.Headers.Add("X-Vermeer-Content-Type", "application/x-vermeer-urlencoded");

                        byte[] data = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes("method=open+service%3a12.0.4518.1016&service_name=%2f");

                        string result = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(webClient.UploadData(url + "/_vti_bin/_vti_aut/author.dll", "POST", data));

                        if (result.IndexOf("\n<li>status=327684") == -1)

                            return url;

                        throw new Exception();

                    }

                }

                catch

                {

                    return GetWebURL(url);

                }

            }

            catch

            {

                return null;

            }

        }

        public static bool Upload(string destinationUrl, byte[] bytes, Dictionary<string, object> metaInfo)

        {

            string result = "";

            string webUrl = GetWebURL(destinationUrl);

            string documentName = destinationUrl.Substring(webUrl.Length + 1);

            return Upload(webUrl, documentName, bytes, metaInfo, out result);

        }

        public static bool Upload(string webUrl, string documentName, byte[] bytes, Dictionary<string, object> metaInfo, out string result)

        {

            string putOption = "overwrite,createdir,migrationsemantics";  // see http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms455325.aspx

            string comment = null;

            bool keepCheckedOut = false;

            string method = "method=put+document%3a12.0.4518.1016&service_name=%2f&document=[document_name={0};meta_info=[{1}]]&put_option={2}&comment={3}&keep_checked_out={4}\n";

            method = String.Format(method, documentName, EncodeMetaInfo(metaInfo), putOption, HttpUtility.UrlEncode(comment), keepCheckedOut.ToString().ToLower());

            List<byte> data = new List<byte>();

            data.AddRange(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(method));

            data.AddRange(bytes);

            try

            {

                using (WebClient webClient = new WebClient())

                {

                    webClient.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials;

                    webClient.Headers.Add("Content-Type", "application/x-vermeer-urlencoded");

                    webClient.Headers.Add("X-Vermeer-Content-Type", "application/x-vermeer-urlencoded");

                    result = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(webClient.UploadData(webUrl + "/_vti_bin/_vti_aut/author.dll", "POST", data.ToArray()));

                    if (result.IndexOf("\n<p>message=successfully") < 0)

                        throw new Exception(result);

                }

            }

            catch (Exception ex)

            {

                result = ex.Message;

                return false;

            }

            return true;

        }

    }

}