Data synchronization is a great feature – it ensures that the data at the source and destination is in sync to each other. The Sync Framework is a Microsoft technology that can deal with the dilemma of occasionally connected systems. It is a comprehensive synchronization platform that enables collaboration and offline and online access for applications, services, and devices. The Microsoft Sync Framework documentation states, “Microsoft Sync Services for ADO.NET lets you synchronize data from different sources over two-tier, N-tier, and service-based architectures. The Sync Services for ADO.NET API for client and server synchronization provides a set of components to synchronize data between data services and a local store, instead of only replicating a database and its schema.” This article provides an overview of the features of Microsoft Sync Framework in a lucid language.
The Sync Framework is a comprehensive framework for synchronizing offline data with the online counterpart. It is a comprehensive synchronization platform that enables collaboration and offline access for applications, services, and devices. In particular, it features technologies and tools that enable device roaming, sharing, and the ability to take networked data offline before synchronizing it back to the networked application at a later time. As discussed earlier, the Microsoft Sync Framework is protocol and database independent - you can use it to can build applications that can synchronize data from any data store using any protocol over the network. You can download Microsoft sync framework from Microsoft download page. http://msdn.microsoft.com/sync
Note that the Microsoft sync framework also ships with Microsoft visual studio 2008 Service pack 1.
Microsoft states: “Microsoft Sync Framework is a comprehensive synchronization platform that enables collaboration and offline access for applications, services, and devices. It features technologies and tools that enable roaming, sharing, and taking data offline. Using Microsoft Sync Framework, developers can build sync ecosystems that integrate any application, with any data from any store using any protocol over any network.”
The most important of all benefits that this framework provides is in its ability to synchronize both offline and online data. It enables any data source to be integrated in the data synchronization, irrespective of the type of the data source.
The following are the salient features of the Microsoft Sync Framework at a glance:
The major components that comprise the Sync Framework include:
The Microsoft Sync Framework ships with built-in providers for synchronizing some very common end points like flat files, simple sharing extensions like rss and atoms and ADO.NET enabled data sources. It also provides developers with necessary infrastructure to quickly create their own custom Sync Provider seamlessly. The Microsoft Sync Framework includes the following providers:
The Microsoft Sync Framework Can Integrate Applications into offline or collaboration-based Networks. It provides an embeddable and scalable platform for enabling synchronization. This article has presented the basic features and benefits of the Microsoft Sync Framework. It was just an overview of this technology. You can know more on this framework by reading my book titled, Pro Sync Framework (APRESS). You can get the book here: http://www.amazon.com/Pro-Sync-Framework-Joydip-Kanjilal/dp/1430210052