CAML Designer
Finally! The new CAML Designer is released! I did not do this alone this time, I co-developed the tool with Andy Van Steenbergen, one of my friends at the BIWUG board.
When I developed the first version of the U2U CAML Builder back in 2004, CAML was an exotic language that nobody knew and nobody wanted to learn. In the beginning the tool lived on the blog of my dear friend Patrick Tisseghem, who unfortunately died in september 2008, far too early. Thanks to the tool, which is used all around the world, each SharePoint developer knows how to use CAML.
The user interface is completely designed in WPF. If you install the tool on a server where you have installed SharePoint 2010, you can logon using the SharePoint server object model. But if you have to use the tool remotely, you can connect to SharePoint 2010 using the .NET client object or the SharePoint web services.
For the moment you can only build queries for SharePoint 2010, but once SharePoint vNext is out, we will upgrade the tool. Once you are logged in to SharePoint, you are able to build queries from very simple to very complex. You can also view code snippets in C# for the SharePoint server object model, for the .NET client object model and for the SharePoint web services.
You can download the tool from the download section of the biwug site. You can find detailed documentation on the tool and on CAML here.
Updated: The version downloadable from the site is a click-onnce application, meaning that each time you start the application, it checks online if no newer version exists. If this is inconvenient to you (because f.e. your server is not connected to the internet) and you want to download an off-line version, you can click this link.
The tool is still in beta and I know there are still a few glitches. We are working on it and will post new versions of the tool frequently. But with the click-once way of installing it, you will be asked to update your version of the tool as soon as we release a new version of it. If you find bugs yourself or if you have ideas please do not hesitate to post a message to camlfeedback@biwug.be.
I hope you enjoy this one!
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About
I’m Karine Bosch and currently I’m working as a freelance O365 and SharePoint Solution Architect .
I still do a lot of work for my previous employer Recomatics, a company located in Destelbergen near Ghent.
Previously I also worked as a Premier Field Engineer for SharePoint @ Microsoft Belgium.
For 5 successive years I’ve been rewarded as SharePoint Server MVP for my contribution to the SharePoint community: I developed the U2U CAML Query Builder and its successor the CAML Designer, which I develop together with Andy Van Steenbergen.
In the many years I worked for U2U, I worked as technical assistant for Patrick Tisseghem who unfortunately died on 3th September 2008. Together with Patrick we developed the alfa and beta versions of the Silverlight BluePrint for SharePoint which contains several samples on how to integrate Silverlight with SharePoint. You can download the samples from http://www.codeplex.com/SL4SP.
I’m also proud board member of the belgian user group BIWUG.
If you don’t find the answers to your questions on this blog, you can always post your questions to the SharePoint 2010 forum or the SharePoint 2013 forum.
Karine Bosch's Blog 
in one Word : Wow!
nice looks very good
Nice new CAML Designer!
Looking forward to trying this out! Glad you guys made a new version, the old one was getting a little rusty. 🙂
[…] https://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2012/05/12/caml-designer/ […]
Working with it as we speak, very nice work!
Just wow!! First CAML Builder, now CAML Designer!!
Hi Karine,
I’ve just tested the tool and it looks nice. Good idea to pre-generate code snippets 🙂 and the WPF UI is user friendly. However, correct me if I’m wrong but I didn’t find any way to perform joins although this is a big addition to CAML in 2010. Did I miss it or didn’t you implement it and if not, any plan to implement it?
I think that this would be a great addition since this is even more complex for developers to deal with projected fields.
Thanks
Best Regards
Works like a charm! (I was still using the old version 🙂 ) Thanks for sharing!!
Any chance you can wrap up an offline installer for this? Kinda difficult to get it installed on a server that has no Internet access.
Stephane, thanks for your positive feedback, it means a lot to me!
It is correct that you cannot perform joins, it is foreseen for the next version. We wanted to release the CAML Designer at the same date of the SharePoint Saturday; and because of its complexity, I was not able to add this functionality in time. I keep you posted on this.
Kind regards,
Karine
Hello Karine,
Thanks for your answer. That’s indeed not an easy functionality to implement but that would clearly be an added value for the tool. Don’t hesitate to give me a shout since I have some ideas on how to implement that :).
Cheers
Stephane, thank you for the offer! If it’s ok for you I’ll contact you within a week or two to hear your ideas on this matter. First have to implement a few small changes 🙂
Karine
No problem 🙂
A time save for all SharePoint people. Thanks for sharing it to us!
Thanks a lot for this update!
Great stuff, thanks! Any plans on building support for logging into SharePoint Online?
We didn’t plan anything like that but if there is a demand for it, we’ll put it on the list of enhancements for one of the next versions.
Thank you very much for this great tool and your work behind.
Karine this looks good. I am doing QueryOverride in a custom CQWP plus some client side stuff so this looks invaluable.
[…] Leave a comment Liking or not, CAML is still out there and in several cases we must use it. This CAML designer makes the task of doing CAML less traumatic for people not very familiar with the syntax or to […]
Useful info. Lucky me I found your web site unintentionally, and I’m surprised why this coincidence did not happened in advance! I bookmarked it.
[…] CAML Designer […]
Pingback by SharePoint 2010: Recopilatorio de enlaces interesantes (XXXII)! - Blog del CIIN | June 1, 2012 |
[…] You can download the tool from this site. […]
Pingback by The new CAML Designer is released - Choroshin Alex | June 14, 2012 |
Looks great but i was unable to download the offline version.
it’s onlt download an DLL?
any Idea?
Can you send a mail to camldesigner@biwug.be? We’ll check it out for you.
ran, Andy uploaded the corrected zip. It should work now.
Kind regards
Not sure if this is user error or bug, but: if I use an “In” comparitor and pick multiple values, only the first one is added to the CAML query.
How do I have a set of comparisons that includes “if expired date is null or greater than today”? Is there a way to indicate an “and” with multiple tests?
[…] https://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2012/05/12/caml-designer/ , CAML Designer makes creating CAML queries a lot easier (successor of U2U CAML Query Builder). […]
Pingback by Top 10 SharePoint Tools | Virtualize SharePoint and SharePoint Virtualization | July 4, 2012 |
Thanks for the updates on an excellent tool all SharePoint developers should use. Not sure if I like the new look, but the results are just as good as the old version.
Usability:
* If Top Right panel (for entering fields) is reduced below minumim size scroll bars should appear.
* Option to NOT execute query as you type
Bug:
* If you add fields, then remove them in the wrong order (top to bottom) you end up with a field or fields you can’t get rid of.
* Need. hourglass during query execution.
Suggestion:
* Allow excution of CAML which has been modified by typing in the CAML window. (Such as to allow sorting operations)
* Option to remember Custom Credentials
Hi Mike,
Thanks for the feedback, we’ll take it into account in next releases. But for your remark on executing the query, you have the option to not execute the query: there is a toggle button “Execute” on the ribbon that you can set to off.
The design of the left fields panel will somewhat change to enable faster scrolling.
About your suggestion of executing CAML you modified in the CAML window, this should already be integrated when in CAML mode (see the description of the tool). Are you sure you downloaded the latest version of the tool?
Kind regards,
Yes I have downloaded the latest Offline tool.
When does anyone ever read the manual 🙂 Didn’t ever need to for the old version.
I will try it out in CAML mode
Toggling execute button speeds up things no end.
CAML mode works allowing quick what if scenarios to be tested 🙂
Please let me know if it works out for you.
Just found another gremlin.
Copied files to VM and used the Server Object Model connection option to connect to a web app running on port 84. I “explodes” when selecting a list to build a query from. Runs ok if I select to use client object model. Am I missing a dependancy?
[…] https://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2012/05/12/caml-designer/ , CAML Designer makes creating CAML queries a lot easier (successor of U2U CAML Query Builder). […]
[…] Download it here […]
Pingback by CAML Builder / Designer « Victor Maceda’s Technical Blog | October 18, 2012 |
Hi Karine,
really love that tool. Saved more than just one day. The wishlist for Join-Support has been posted before, I would agree with that.
A “smaller” wish would be to allow Code posted in the source Window that contains Line Breaks (Enter). It is a bit annoying to first have to remove all new Lines before pasting it.
Another small wish: When clicking the “Execute” button next to the Caml-Source-Area and no Result will be retrieved, please empty the right results list instead of just keeping the old data.
Thanks for this great tool
Ole Albers
Hi Ole,
Thanks for your feedback! At the moment we are fighting to get a new version ready for the SharePoint Conference @ Las Vegas. but I’ll add your suggestions to the list as they are all valuable points. After Vegas we’ll start working on the SP210 version again.
Kind regards,
Karine
[…] to write good, old CAML. You can try writing the CAML-queries by hand, but I recommend checking out CAML Designer, SharePoint CAML Query Helper or some other tool to help you write those hairy […]
Pingback by Querying for current user’s items using the Content by Query Web Part’s QueryOverride property | Developer at War | December 1, 2012 |
Great tool!!
[…] CAML Designer rend plus facile l’écriture de requêtes CAML. C’est le successeur de U2U CAML Query Builder. […]
Pingback by Guide des meilleures pratiques SharePoint 2010 | Claude Couderc | August 25, 2013 |
Good good !
Is there a scheduled date for the join add? It woul be so good!
[…] https://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2012/05/12/caml-designer/ , CAML Designer makes creating CAML queries a lot easier (successor of U2U CAML Query Builder). […]
Pingback by SharePoint 2010 Best Practices | December 2, 2013 |
[…] CAML Designer rend plus facile l’écriture de requêtes CAML. C’est le successeur de U2U CAML Query Builder. […]
Pingback by Guide des meilleures pratiques SharePoint 2010 | | March 5, 2014 |
I am not able to login to my site it always gives me this error :
Insufficient Data : PLease check the credentials . Although , I login with these all the time .
Hi Saud, which version of SharePoint is your site?
Karine
Karine , my site is using sharepoint2010 . I am trying to login using the spadmin credentials and it always gives me the user credentials error .. I understand i have to select sharepoint 2010 and de select all other options . Please let me know where i am goong wrong . Thanks .
This site was… how do I say it? Relevant!! Finally I have
found something which helped me. Kudos!
[…] instructions for using the tool can be found on Karine’s blog post about the CAML Designer here. The purpose of this post is really just to make our intermediate level users aware of this option. […]
Pingback by CAML Designer - An easier option when creating your own CAML queries - | November 16, 2016 |
[…] CAML Designer rend plus facile l’écriture de requêtes CAML. C’est le successeur de U2U CAML Query Builder. […]
Pingback by Meilleures pratiques SharePoint - Claude Couderc Consulting | May 9, 2018 |
Download links are dead.
Hi Jussi,
We know, but we are not sure if we are going to investigate more spare time in it. We both have jobs, and it’s hard to continuously investigate free time in it.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
Kind regards,
Karine