The CASI Kit Announcement from SharePoint Conference

Just wanted to update folks with the announcement made at the SharePoint Conference yesterday regarding the CASI Kit.  I have decided to release everything for it - full source code to the base class, the web part, and all of the sample projects - up to CodePlex.  If you go to casikit.codeplex.com now you can get everything that makes this toolkit.  In addition to that you will find:

  • A video that walks you through the process of building an application with the CASI Kit
  • The sample project that I built out at SharePoint Conference - both the starting project and completed project - along with written step by step instructions for building it yourself.  The CASI Kit is simple enough to use that the instructions for building the application fit on a single page!
  • All of the written guidance for using the CASI Kit

The reasons for doing this primarily came down to this:

  1. By having the source code available, if you have any issues or find bugs, etc., you have the source code - you can put it in the debugger, you can step through code, you can make changes as needed.  So you should have full comfort that you aren't just relying on a black box unsupported component; now you can see everything that's going on and how it's doing it.
  2. As features in the SharePoint product change over time, having the source code allows you to modify it and change it to stay in step with those changes.  For example, if new ways are added to connect up SharePoint and other cloud services then you can modify the code to take advantage of those new platform features, or even transition off the CASI Kit in a prescriptive manner.  With the source code, you're in control of adapting to those changes in the future.
  3. You now have the opportunity to build other solutions, whatever you want, using the CASI Kit as is or breaking it apart and using it as a really big building block to your own custom applications. 

Hopefully you will find this source code and kit useful for connecting to Windows Azure and other cloud-based services going forward.  Enjoy!