External data lookup column is a column type that allows you to look up and link one or several items, located in one of your line-of-business applications, to a form item and store a snapshot of the external data inside that item.
You start by specifying the data source connection, such as database connection string or web service URL, selecting a table, view or operation and mapping one or more fields. You can even give user-friendly names to those fields.
When editing a form item, you can select external items by a unique key column and the data from the external system is imported into the form item.
The External data lookup column can connect to any database supporting MS-SQL native, Oracle native, OLE DB or ODBC driver, which would mean the vast majority of existing databases, or any web service conforming to the SOAP or REST standard.
