Basic URI Structure and Path
Applies to: SharePoint Server 2010
This topic explains how to construct the URI structure and path for REST service commands in Excel Services.
Basic URL Structure and Path
The REST API in Excel Services gives you the ability to access resources like charts, PivotTables, tables, and named ranges in a workbook directly through a URL. Each REST URL in Excel Services is built of three parts. Following is the basic structure of the URL to access the resources in a workbook:
REST aspx Page URI The entry point to an .aspx page
Workbook Location The path to the workbook
Resource Location The path to the requested resource inside the workbook
Following is the construct for the REST URL to a specific element in a workbook:
http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx/<DocumentLibrary>/<FileName>/<ResourceLocation>
Following is an example of how a REST URL in Excel Services looks with all three parts combined. In this example, the REST URL is accessing a workbook called "sampleWorkbook.xlsx" that contains a chart called "SampleChart":
http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx/Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx/model/Charts('SampleChart')
The workbook is stored in a document library. The full path to the workbook is http://<ServerName>/Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx.
The three parts of the REST URL are:
REST aspx Page URI: http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx
Workbook Location: /Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx
Resource Location: /model/Ranges('nameOfTheNamedRange')
Accessing by Using the Discovery User Interface
You can also access the chart by using the discovery user interface. To learn how access resources like charts, tables, PivotTables, and ranges by using the discovery mechanism shown in the following screen shot, see Discovery in Excel Services REST API.
Marker Path
Following is the aspx page for the REST service in Excel Services:
http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx
To access the REST service in Excel Services, you must preface the URL with http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx.
Workbook Location
The workbook location is the relative path to the workbook that has resources that you are interested in accessing. For example, assume that you have a workbook named sampleWorkbook.xlsx, saved to a trusted SharePoint document library. In this example, following is the path to the location of sampleWorkbook.xlsx:
http://<ServerName>/Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx
You take the relative path to the workbook (Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx) and append it to the marker path. Following is the URL with the marker path and workbook location appended:
http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx
Resource Location
The resource location is the path inside the workbook to the element that you request. For example, if you want to get a chart, the resource location would be similar to /model/Charts('Chart 1').
For the full URL, you append this to the marker path and the relative path to the workbook. Following is the full example URL:
http://<ServerName>/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx/Docs/Documents/sampleWorkbook.xlsx/model/Charts('Chart 1')