Consuming Sharepoint Document library in ASP.NET

Question

We have a ASP.NET Web application. We want to use SharePoint document library for Documents Management and archival. We are new to Sharepoint. We have a sharepoint admin team asking for the details of tasks they need to do integrate with ASP.NET. We are maintaining user level permissions in ASP.NET. Please clarify me on the following points:

1. Can we connect to Sharepoint using its WebServices? We don't want to consume using Sharepoint Object Model which needs installation in ASP.NET WebServer. We want to upload,checkin,checkout,delete and download using webservice.

2. Can we ask Sharepoint Admin to create one root level folder and a user for our application using which we can upload document using WebService? We will restrict permissions using our ASP.NET application.

3. Asking them to archive documents periodically. Does this require any workflow or just a configuration from Sharepoint Admin?

Answer 1

Can we connect to Sharepoint using its WebServices? We don't want to consume using Sharepoint Object Model which needs installation in ASP.NET WebServer. We want to upload,checkin,checkout,delete and download using webservice.

Mostly it's possible, also you can use client object model from SharePoint for this.

Can we ask Sharepoint Admin to create one root level folder and a user for our application using which we can upload document using WebService? We will restrict permissions using our ASP.NET application.

Yes

Asking them to archive documents periodically. Does this require any workflow or just a configuration from Sharepoint Admin?

This depends on what you mean under "archive" - make a zip of root folder somewhere or backup of document library. For zipping you need a 3rd party or your own solution (may be a workflow or timer job). For backup you need only a Power Shell script for executing granular backup. See more at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee428301#section1 Then you can automate script running in Windows Task Scheduler.