Introduction

OData (Open Data Protocol) allows applications such as Microsoft Power BI, MS Sharepoint, and other Apps to readily consume queryable information in a simple and standard way.

OData is a REST-based protocol for querying and updating data and is built on standardized technologies such as HTTP, Atom/XML, and JSON. It is different from other REST-based web services in that it provides a uniform way to describe both the data and the data model.

OData and Vtiger CRM

Vtiger provides an entry point to access data in OData format. User can hit the OData URL and provide credentials to fetch information from any module

For example, To fetch data from Contacts module
instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts

Authentication

Parameters

It even allows fetching filtered data

• Fetch selected fields
  instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts?$select=firstname,lastname
• Fetch with conditions
  instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts?$filter=firstname eq 'Mark'
• Fetch with limit
  instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts?$top=10
• Skip few records from the result (we can use this for paging)
  instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts?$skip=10&$top=10
• Count the total number of records
  instance_url/restapi/V1/OData/Pull/odata.svc/Contacts/$count

Limitations:

• To ensure optimal performance, results are limited to 5000 records per request. To get the next set of records, you can use the Skip command.