Get a List by Name (not Title)

[pruembeli]

SharePoint Online, and PnpCore seem to use ID and GetByTitle as default to access a List but I want to get the list by the name.
Example:
When you create a List in SharePoint Online it will have a name that is added as Title.
Create List -> "TheBestList" -> change Title to "This list is beautiful".
Name: "TheBestList"
Title: "This list is beautiful"
Url : site/Lists/TheBestList
Since list the titles can be changed anytime and I don't want to work/store the IDs, can I work with the name and find lists by the name?
I was looking for an property in IList https://github.com/pnp/pnpcore/blob/dev/src/sdk/PnP.Core/Model/SharePoint/Core/Public/IList.cs but could not find anything.
Greetings and Thanks
Philipp

[gszdev]

Hi @pruembeli,
Have a look at Working with lists
Try to use GetByServerRelativeUrl.
You can combine the ServerRelatvieUrl of the site (/sites/site) with the WebRelativeUrl of the list (Lists/TheBestList) as first parameter (serverRelativeUrl) of GetByServerRelativeUrlAsync

[pruembeli]

Thank you
I guess that is the way to go, I just don't understand why there is no "Name" property in the IList, so the example
in "Working with lists" for where query is like this:
var myList = await context.Web.Lists.Where(p=>p.Title == "Documents").FirstOrDefaultAsync();
this could be:
var myList = await context.Web.Lists.Where(p=>p.Name == "TheBestList").FirstOrDefaultAsync();

Now I have to assemble urls and I have to care if the library or list was created in web/Lists or directly under Web.
Greetings

[gszdev]

@pruembeli
FYI:

• A SharePoint list does not have a name. It has only an ID (GUID), an URL and a Title to identitfy.
• The 'Title' property is not the best way to get the list, because it can be localized (for details see TitleResource, ...).
• The 'ID' property is managed by SharePoint and you cannot set it. So it is different in each site.
• Using Where()-method is not ideal, because your are forcing SharePoint to iterate through all lists within the web. Using FirstOrDefaultAsync() is slightly better.
  var list = await currentWeb.Lists.FirstOrDefaultAsync(x => x.Title == "Documents");

You can use / reuse the Combine method from PnP.Core.UrlUtility or PnP.Framework.Utilities.UrlUtility
var relativeUrl = UrlUtility.Combine(web.ServerRelativeUrl, "Lists/TheBestList")

[pruembeli]

I changed from
context.Web.Lists.GetByTitle(listTitel);
to
var listUrl = context.Web.ServerRelativeUrl + "/Lists/TheBestList";
context.Web.Lists.GetByServerRelativeUrl(listUrl);
and now I get the exception when already accessing the web property: "Property ServerRelativeUrl"was not yet loaded."
I did not load the web and did not need to load the web so far, the context is initialised in the program.cs an then injected where I use it. Guess I need to load the web now?

Update:
Found this tutorial:
https://pnp.github.io/pnpcore/using-the-sdk/basics-context.html#loading-additional-iweb-and-isite-properties-when-creating-a-pnpcontext

[gszdev]

I don't know how you get the Web (PnPContext).
Yes, you can and should load the needed property on connecting / opening the web (creating the PnPContext).
Or you can call the following to ensure that the need property is loaded, if not it will be loaded:
await web.EnsurePropertiesAsync(w => w.ServerRelativeUrl);

To optimize your requests to SharePoint you should load as much properties as possible with one / first request (as few as possible) requests.
Each call of EnsurePropertiesAsync will invoke another request if the needed property is not loaded.
Details: Avoid getting throttled or blocked in SharePoint Online

[gszdev]

@pruembeli
Have a look at Working with list items.

[pruembeli]

Thank you for the help, this is now working great.
I am still don't understand why there is no "list name" property in the IList class/object but I can work around this now.
Conclusion: Microsoft should improve SharePoint here.
Greetings