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Answered Error creating an External Content Type

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      Thursday, July 01, 2010 8:16 PM
       
       
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      I am creating an external content type in SharePoint Designer 2010. Upon clicking on "Create Lists & Form" and entering the list name, I get the following error.

       

      Could not save changes. No Finders available in the View Group associated with the SpecificFinder (Read Item) operation 'xxxxxx' on Entity (External Content Type) with Namespace 'xxxxx' The list cannot be created.

       

      Not very helpful... I suspect the message text is referring to elements in the underlying XML but I'm not dealing directly with the XML. Any help in deciphering the message and pointing me to the actual cause is appreciated.

       

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    • Thursday, August 19, 2010 11:33 PM
       
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      Sorry Matt - I clicked on the wrong response item.  I realized that the problem I was having is that I didn't have a read item for the ECT.  However, I've also realized that if the result object from the read item is a complex object (meaning there are sub-objects in the object), you will encounter the same problem.  For example, if you are trying to reference a customer and and the address is a complex object with Street, city, state, zip, etc.

      If you are only trying to read and not write then you can simply declare all your "sub-objects" as strings and your ECT will work just fine.  However, if you want to read/write like I do then some coding in VS is the only option.  That's where i'm currently stuck...

      Hope this helps...

       

      Cheers,

      KBW

       

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    • Thursday, July 01, 2010 9:42 PM
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      It's referring to the Finder method, which is used by the External List forms to show individual items.  After the external content type is created and has all of its operations, then click on Lists and Libraries in the left nav (site objects), then click "New External List" and try to create it.

      When you created the ECT, did you create a Read Item operation?

      SharePoint Architect || Microsoft MVP || My Blog
       
    • Friday, July 02, 2010 1:27 PM
       
       
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      Yes, I've created both the read item and read list operations. FWIW I have created the profile page, it appears to be working just fine. I should also mention that I'm only interested in reading this content type, I don't plan on writing anything back to the database.
       
    • Monday, August 02, 2010 1:17 PM
       
       
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      Hey Matt, did you solve this issue? I seem to have the same problem.

      Greetings from germany

       
    • Sunday, August 15, 2010 9:41 PM
       
       
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      Did anyone manage to solve this issue?  I'm receiving the same error when trying to create an "External List" against an ECT I've created against my web service.

      I've tried but cannot figure out what the basis of the error is.  Please HELP!

       

      Thanks,

      Kedrick

       
    • Thursday, August 19, 2010 11:33 PM
       
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      Sorry Matt - I clicked on the wrong response item.  I realized that the problem I was having is that I didn't have a read item for the ECT.  However, I've also realized that if the result object from the read item is a complex object (meaning there are sub-objects in the object), you will encounter the same problem.  For example, if you are trying to reference a customer and and the address is a complex object with Street, city, state, zip, etc.

      If you are only trying to read and not write then you can simply declare all your "sub-objects" as strings and your ECT will work just fine.  However, if you want to read/write like I do then some coding in VS is the only option.  That's where i'm currently stuck...

      Hope this helps...

       

      Cheers,

      KBW

       
    • Tuesday, November 09, 2010 9:39 PM
       
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      Try making sure that the columns in your Read List and Read Item Operations are the same. This is what I had to do when I converted my BDC files of my SP2007 system to BCS files. BTW, I did that by creating a fresh SP2007 standalone virtual machine, exporting the BDC files from my SP2007 installation, importing them into the fresh SP2007 VM, updating to SP2010 in place and then exporting the resulting BCS files for import into my real SP2010 installation. Everything was fine with the import into my real SP2010 installation and I had my external content types but could not create an external list until I made the columns of the Read List and Read Item operations the same. I haven't tried, but perhaps it may also work if the Read Item columns are a superset of the Read List columns.

      Hope that helps!

      Nick

      • Proposed As Answer by Tom Resing MCM Friday, November 18, 2011 12:08 AM
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    • Wednesday, December 29, 2010 7:13 PM
       
       
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      I'm having the same problem. All columns other than the ID are of type System.String. The Read Item and Read List operations have the same columns. This data source is for reading only so there are no other operations. Also there are no associations on the ECT.
       
    • Tuesday, March 08, 2011 8:14 PM
       
       
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      Hi Matt,

      I don't know if you've resolved this issue but the problem is that you need to create a Read List operation in order to display a list from your ECT.

      Thanks, KBW
       
    • Sunday, September 25, 2011 10:19 AM
       
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      a possible soulution for you who get the same error message

      I had the same error when trying to create an external list from a SQL connection with only "read list" and read item

      the reason was that when setting up my "read item" i had this warning that one of the columns data type is not supported, so I unchecked it in "read item"

      Errors and warnings

      The data types for data source elements createdTime (System,Byte[]) are not supported in external lists. The data for these fields will not be displayed. Create and Update operabons may not be available. Refer to the external list documentation for details and customization

      options.

       

      But since there were no warning when creating the "read list" I never unchecked the column and hence I got the same error as Matt:

      "Could not save changes. No Finders available in the View Group associated with the SpecificFinder (Read Item) operation 'xxxxxx' on Entity (External Content Type) with Namespace 'xxxxx' The list cannot be created."

      The "Finders" is what MS call the "read item" and it has got to have the same settings as the "read list" (from what I understand this far).

      I hope this can be of help,

      //JimiSweden

       

       

      • Proposed As Answer by Alcide Wednesday, December 07, 2011 11:55 PM
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    • Tuesday, December 06, 2011 6:53 PM
       
       
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      Common error - especially with many entity properties. The designer should ideally have a common canvas for property selection so that the same properties can be selected for both Finder and Specific Finder methods.

      If you have to use a byte[] property (e.g. SecurityDescriptor), you can export the model, add a .NET Assembly and manipulate it from there. 

      Then there's always BCS Meta Man...

      Good luck

      Step 

       
    • Tuesday, February 14, 2012 2:55 PM
       
       
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      I had the same error when having in the 'Read List' properties 'Required' and 'Read Only' checked for a data source element. It will give you a warning but no error.

      Unchecking the 'Required' field will fix the issue and you can create a list.

      Worked for me...