Using join forms in web services

You can use join forms in web services but only for parent forms; child forms cannot be join forms. For information about join forms, see Join-forms.

Using primary keys

You can use join forms for publishing or consuming in the same way as regular forms except for certain considerations when choosing a primary key in the Define form mapping dialog box. When you map the parent form, the primary key must be unique to the join form. The base forms that comprise the join form can each have a unique key. The Request ID of the join form is a concatenation of the Request IDs of the join base forms.

Because the primary key must be unique to the join form, this provides the following possibilities:

For a Create operation:
When you publish a web service using a join form, a Create operation is not automatically generated; you must make the Create operation yourself.
If the join form is an inner join, the Primary key can be a Unique Index from any of the base forms that comprise the join form.
If the join form is an outer join, the Primary key can be a Unique Index only from the primary base form.
The primary key cannot be the Request ID field.
For a Set operation:
If the join form is an inner join, the primary key can be one of the following items:
- Request ID of the join form
- Request ID of any of the base forms
- Unique Index from any of the base forms.
If the join form is an outer join, the primary key can be one of the following items:
- Request ID of the join form
- Request ID of the primary base form
- Unique Index of a field from the primary base form

Using output mapping

In a Create operation, if the web service base form is a join form, the output mapping is ignored and neither a document nor a Request ID is returned.

Join form in web services example

In the following example, PO - People is an inner join form between the PO form and the People form. The Unique key in the PO form is POID, the Unique key in the People form is Name, and the join criteria between the two forms are Name (of PO form)= Name (of People form). Because the Unique key POID is also unique in the join form, select it as the Primary key.

Join form in web services