Create a list, columns and view programmatically

Posted on February 9, 2009

Next task on my prep – create a list programmatically. Then I want to add some columns to it, and show these on the default view. Actually, it’s mostly pretty easy (apart from that last part).

Well, creating a list is pretty easy.

SPSite siteCol = new SPSite(@"http://vm-moss2007/test/");
SPWeb site = siteCol.OpenWeb();
site.Lists.Add("New Calendar", "This calendar was created programmatically", site.ListTemplates["Calendar"]);

Here you can see me getting an SPWeb object, and then adding to itsSPListCollection. You have to supply a template for the list, and this depends on the templates available on the site – hence getting the template from theSPListTemplateCollection.

I wanted a custom list, and I wanted it to appear on the left navigation:

site.Lists.Add("My Custom List", "This list was created programmatically", site.ListTemplates["Custom List"]);
SPList newList = site.Lists["My Custom List"];
newList.OnQuickLaunch = true;
newList.Update();

Great! And now I want to add some columns. First I added a text column:

newList.Fields.Add("NewText", SPFieldType.Text, true);
And then a lookup column (as I figured this would be a hard one):

SPList targetList = site.Lists["My Lookup Target"];
SPField targetField = targetList.Fields["My Target Lookup Column"];
newList.Fields.AddLookup("NewLookup", targetList.ID, false);
SPFieldLookup lkp = (SPFieldLookup)newList.Fields["NewLookup"];
lkp.LookupField = targetField.InternalName;
lkp.Update();

First I get the target list and the target field for the lookup. I add a new lookup column, but for some strange reason none of the SPFieldLookup class’s constructors allow me to create one supplying a target list and column. Also, none of the SPFieldCollection’s methods allow me to add a lookup supplying a target column.

Thus, I end up getting the column I’ve just created and assigning the column that I want use as the value of the lookup. Crazy. I’m sure that there must be a better way of doing this (i.e. in one call) but I don’t see how.

Anyway, it works; my columns are added. Now I want to show them in the default view:

//*** Doesn't work for some obscure reason ***
newList.DefaultView.ViewFields.Add("NewText");
newList.DefaultView.ViewFields.Add("NewLookup");
newList.DefaultView.Update();

As the code subtly hints, this code didn’t work – my columns weren’t shown in the default view. However, the code below does work:

SPView view = newList.DefaultView;
view.ViewFields.Add("NewText");
view.ViewFields.Add("NewLookup");
view.Update();