Applications live and die on their data, and without some form of data, an app wouldn’t be able to do much.
Some data is merely temporary and is stored while the app is running, such as:
- Data entered by the user
- Data related to the state of the app; for example, while a user is playing a game, the app would need to store their score, name, and the current state of the board (for board games) or location (for adventure games)
Some data is stored in data stores or databases for use with other users, for example:
- Business data, such as invoices and sales orders
- Sports data, such as teams and players and their statistics
- Geological data, such as earthquakes, their magnitude, and locations
There are many such examples. The data must be stored in a central location, and you must know how to connect to it.
A data resource in an SAP Build Apps application defines all the details needed to connect with the data. Generally, this is a REST or OData service and requires a URL and some parameters to specify what data to return.