Consuming Data

Abstract

An application would be nothing without data. Those data can come from a number of different sources, ranging from a local database, XML or JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) files to a database in the Cloud, or a REST (representational state transfer) service. Windows Store applications allow us to use a range of data stores, although the focus lies mostly on Cloud-connected apps. Although the local database of choice was SQL compact edition in Windows Phone 7, it’s now the open source SQLite in Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. As far as services are concerned, we can target WCF services, sockets, RSS, oData, REST services, and so on. I advise you to choose the method you’re most familiar with, but do keep in mind that some constraints might apply in Windows Store apps. Take WCF, for example, it is supported in the Windows Store but it doesn’t support all the bindings. Only BasicHttpbinding, NetTcpBinding, NetHttpBinding, and CustomBinding are supported. Since it’s perfectly possible to write an entire book on data services, I will focus on the most common and most popular ways of building a service in this chapter.