Camlex 5.1 and Camlex.Client 3.2 have been released: support for Includes/NotIncludes operations

Good news for Sharepoint developers which use Camlex and Camlex.Client in their work (Camlex is free open source library for simplifying creation of CAML queries in Sharepoint by using C# lambda expressions): today new versions Camlex 5.1 and Camlex.Client 3.2 have been released. In this version support of Include/NotInclude CAML operations was added to the library. Here is what MSDN says about Includes element:

If the specified field is a Lookup field that allows multiple values, specifies that the Value element is included in the list item for the field that is specified by the FieldRef element.

and about NotIncludes:

If the specified field is a Lookup field that allows multiple values, specifies that the Value element is excluded from the list item for the field that is specified by the FieldRef element.

I.e. these operations are used for multi lookup fields. And although there are known workarounds which allows to use another operations to make similar queries (see e.g. CAML query for field of type “Person or Group” which allows multiple selections) I’ve decided to add support of official operations for multiple lookup field types in order to have complete set of CAML operations in Camlex. Let’s see how it works.

In order to create CAML query with Includes operation with Camlex use the following syntax:

string caml = Camlex.Query().Where(x => ((int)x["Foo"]).Includes(1)).ToString();

Here we used Includes extension method defined in Camlex. It will produce the following CAML:

<Where>
  <Includes>
    <FieldRef Name="Foo" />
    <Value Type="Integer">1</Value>
  </Includes>
</Where>

If we need to perform query using lookup id (i.e. add LookupId=”TRUE” attribute to FieldRef element) – use overloaded version of Includes method with boolean parameter and pass true there:

string caml = Camlex.Query().Where(x => ((int)x["Foo"]).Includes(1, true)).ToString();

which will produce:

<Where>
  <Includes>
    <FieldRef Name="Foo" LookupId="True" />
    <Value Type="Integer">1</Value>
  </Includes>
</Where>

The same functionality is also added to Camlex.Client – Camlex version built for CSOM. Both Camlex and Camlex.Client are available in Nuget. You may add them to your projects by using the following commands:

Install-Package Camlex.NET.dll

or for CSOM version:

Install-Package Camlex.Client.dll

Hope that new feature will help in your work.