Basically I have a gridview that is loaded when a DataSet is returned from the web service, but going at it this way makes me lose some of the benefits of the gridview like the simplicity in sorting, updating, deleting, rows, etc.
Is there a way I can use a web service, but still have access to using a SqlDataSource binded to the GridView. I can't return a webcontrol like SqlDataSource, but maybe there is a way around?
First of all, I suggest you to move from ASP.NET web-service to WCF-service - you can use the WCF Data Services. for example. You should note what this is not exactly the SqlDataSource.
But if you want to use the ASP.NET web-service, I think this article will help you: How To Use a Web Service as a Data Source for a Client Application in Visual C# .NET.
The main point is what you can setup your method to return a DataSet:
[WebMethod]
public DataSet GetCustOrders(string IDMask)
{
// your code here
}
But Web-services are old technology and your shouldn't use them.
Internally, no there is no seamless web service binding, either on the client or server. The SQLDataSource is meant to directly communicate with the database and ignore external components. If you switch to an ObjectDataSource, the method called can refer to a component, which then communicates with the web service, but on the server only.
Are you looking to do this on the client? Neither control supports client-side binding, but you can build the UI yourself, or use a JS equivalent control for binding such as ASP.NET AJAX 4.0 templates or the dataview component.
HTH.
SqlDataSourceimplies local access to the data (a SQL data store), which you don't have from a web service.