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Get the Report →A PostgreSQL Interface for BambooHR Data
Use the Remoting features of the BambooHR JDBC Driver to create a PostgreSQL entry-point for data access.
There are a vast number of PostgreSQL clients available on the Internet. From standard Drivers to BI and Analytics tools, PostgreSQL is a popular interface for data access. Using our JDBC Drivers, you can now create PostgreSQL entry-points that you can connect to from any standard client.
To access BambooHR data as a PostgreSQL database, use the CData JDBC Driver for BambooHR and a JDBC foreign data wrapper (FDW). In this article, we compile the FDW, install it, and query BambooHR data from PostgreSQL Server.
Connect to BambooHR Data as a JDBC Data Source
To connect to BambooHR as a JDBC data source, you will need the following:
- Driver JAR path: The JAR is located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory.
Driver class:
cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver
- JDBC URL:
The URL must start with "jdbc:api:" and can include any of the connection properties in name-value pairs separated with semicolons.
Start by setting the Profile connection property to the location of the BambooHR Profile on disk (e.g. C:\profiles\bamboohr.apip). Next, set the ProfileSettings connection property to the connection string for BambooHR (see below).
BambooHR API Profile Settings
In order to authenticate to BambooHR, you'll need to provide your API Key. To generate an API key, log in and click your name in the upper right-hand corner of any page to get to the user context menu. If you have sufficient permissions, there will be an "API Keys" option in that menu to go to the page, where you can create a new API Key. Additionally, you will need to set the Domain, found in the domain name of your BambooHR account. For example if your BambooHR account is acmeinc.bamboohr.com, then the Domain should be 'acmeinc'. Set both the API Key and Domain in the ProfileSettings property to connect.
Built-in Connection String Designer
For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the BambooHR JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.
java -jar cdata.jdbc.api.jar
Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.
A typical JDBC URL is below:
jdbc:api:Profile=C:\profiles\BambooHR.apip;ProfileSettings='Domain=acmeinc;APIKey=your_api_key';
Build the JDBC Foreign Data Wrapper
The Foreign Data Wrapper can be installed as an extension to PostgreSQL, without recompiling PostgreSQL. The jdbc2_fdw extension is used as an example (downloadable here).
- Add a symlink from the shared object for your version of the JRE to /usr/lib/libjvm.so. For example:
ln -s /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-openjdk/jre/lib/amd64/server/libjvm.so /usr/lib/libjvm.so
- Start the build:
make install USE_PGXS=1
Query BambooHR Data as a PostgreSQL Database
After you have installed the extension, follow the steps below to start executing queries to BambooHR data:
- Log into your database.
-
Load the extension for the database:
CREATE EXTENSION jdbc2_fdw;
-
Create a server object for BambooHR:
CREATE SERVER API FOREIGN DATA WRAPPER jdbc2_fdw OPTIONS ( drivername 'cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver', url 'jdbc:api:Profile=C:\profiles\BambooHR.apip;ProfileSettings='Domain=acmeinc;APIKey=your_api_key';', querytimeout '15', jarfile '/home/MyUser/CData/CData\ JDBC\ Driver\ for\ Salesforce MyDriverEdition/lib/cdata.jdbc.api.jar');
-
Create a user mapping for the username and password of a user known to the MySQL daemon.
CREATE USER MAPPING for postgres SERVER API OPTIONS ( username 'admin', password 'test');
-
Create a foreign table in your local database:
postgres=# CREATE FOREIGN TABLE employees ( employees_id text, employees_Id text, employees_DisplayName numeric) SERVER API OPTIONS ( table_name 'employees');
postgres=# SELECT * FROM employees;