DataBind Facebook Data to the DevExpress Data Grid

The ADO.NET Provider for Facebook by CData incorporates conventional ADO.NET data access components compatible with third-party controls. You can adhere to the standard ADO.NET data binding procedures to establish two-way access to real-time data through UI controls. This article will demonstrate the utilization of CData components for data binding with DevExpress UI Controls (Windows Forms and Web controls), specifically binding to a chart that visualizes live data.

Most tables require user authentication as well as application authentication. Facebook uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate to Facebook, you can use the embedded OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL or you can obtain your own by registering an app with Facebook.

See the Getting Started chapter of the help documentation for a guide to using OAuth.

Windows Forms Controls

The code below shows how to populate a DevExpress chart with Facebook data. The FacebookDataAdapter binds to the Series property of the chart control. The Diagram property of the control defines the x- and y-axes as the column names.

using (FacebookConnection connection = new FacebookConnection(
"InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;")) {
 FacebookDataAdapter dataAdapter = new FacebookDataAdapter(
 "SELECT FromName, LikesCount FROM Posts", connection);
 
 DataTable table = new DataTable();
 dataAdapter.Fill(table);
 DevExpress.XtraCharts.Series series = new DevExpress.XtraCharts.Series();
 chartControl1.Series.Add(series);
 series.DataSource = table;
 series.ValueDataMembers.AddRange(new string[] { "LikesCount" });
 series.ArgumentScaleType = DevExpress.XtraCharts.ScaleType.Qualitative;
 series.ArgumentDataMember = "FromName";
 series.ValueScaleType = DevExpress.XtraCharts.ScaleType.Numerical;
 chartControl1.Legend.Visibility = DevExpress.Utils.DefaultBoolean.False;
 ((DevExpress.XtraCharts.SideBySideBarSeriesView)series.View).ColorEach = true; 
}

Web Controls

The code below shows how to populate a DevExpress Web control with Facebook data. The FacebookDataAdapter binds to the Series property of the chart; the Diagram property defines the x- and y-axes as the column names.

using DevExpress.XtraCharts;

using (FacebookConnection connection = new FacebookConnection(
"InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;"))
{
 FacebookDataAdapter FacebookDataAdapter1 = new FacebookDataAdapter("SELECT FromName, LikesCount FROM Posts", connection);
 DataTable table = new DataTable();
 FacebookDataAdapter1.Fill(table);
 DevExpress.XtraCharts.Series series = new Series("Series1", ViewType.Bar);
 WebChartControl1.Series.Add(series);
 series.DataSource = table;
 series.ValueDataMembers.AddRange(new string[] { "LikesCount" });
 series.ArgumentScaleType = ScaleType.Qualitative;
 series.ArgumentDataMember = "FromName";
 series.ValueScaleType = ScaleType.Numerical;
 ((DevExpress.XtraCharts.SideBySideBarSeriesView)series.View).ColorEach = true;
}