Configuring a Connection
After Installing the Connector you can connect and create a Data Source for data in API.
Setting Up a Data Source
Complete the following steps to connect to the data:
- Under Connect | To a Server, click More....
- Select the data source called API by CData.
- Enter the information required for the connection.
- Click Sign In.
- If necessary, select a Database and Schema to discover what tables and views are available.
Using the Connection Builder
The connector makes the most common connection properties available directly in Tableau. However, it can be difficult to use if you need to use more advanced settings or need to troubleshoot connection issues. The connector includes a separate connection builder that allows you to create and test connections outside of Tableau.
There are two ways to access the connection builder:
- On Windows, use a shortcut called Connection Builder in the Start menu, under the CData Tableau Connector for API folder.
- You can also start the connection builder by going to the driver install directory and running the .jar file in the lib directory.
In the connection builder, you can set values for connection properties and click Test Connection to validate that they work. You can also use the Copy to Clipboard button to save the connection string. This connection string can be given to the Connection String option included in the connector connection window in Tableau.
The CData Tableau Connector for API can be used to connect to a variety of data sources from within your application.
Connecting to Profiles
The connector can be used to connect to a variety of data sources, called Profiles, from within your application. An API profile is a collection of schemas modeling data from an application or online service as tables, views or stored procedures. API Profile files have the file exension ".apip" and can be download from the CData website.
To establish a connection using a Profile, set the Profile property to the path of the API profile file, and ProfileSettings to a connection string containing the credentials to the data-source. The most common forms of authentication are supported, including HTTP basic, HTTP digest, NTLM, and OAuth. For more information on the required connection properties, please refer to the documentation of each profile.
Next Step
See Using the Connector to create data visualizations.