Use the CData JDBC Driver for HCL Domino in MicroStrategy

MicroStrategy is an analytics and mobility platform that enables data-driven innovation. When you pair MicroStrategy with the CData JDBC Driver for HCL Domino, you gain database-like access to live HCL Domino data from MicroStrategy, expanding your reporting and analytics capabilities. In this article, we walk through creating a database instance for HCL Domino in MicroStrategy Developer and create a Warehouse Catalog for the HCL Domino data.

The CData JDBC Driver offers unmatched performance for interacting with live HCL Domino data in MicroStrategy due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from MicroStrategy to HCL Domino, the driver pushes supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to HCL Domino and utilizes the embedded SQL engine to process unsupported operations (often SQL functions and JOIN operations) client-side. With built-in dynamic metadata querying, you can visualize and analyze HCL Domino data using native MicroStrategy data types.

Connect to HCL Domino in MicroStrategy Developer

You can connect to HCL Domino in MicroStrategy Developer by adding a database instance based on the CData JDBC Driver for HCL Domino.^* Before you begin, you will need to install the JDBC Driver for HCL Domino on the machine hosting the MicroStrategy Intelligence Server that your instance of MicroStrategy Developer is connected to.

1. Open MicroStrategy Developer and select a Project Source.
2. Navigate to Administration -> Configuration Managers -> Database Instances and right-click to add a new instance.
3. Name the instance, select Generic DBMS as the database connection type, and create a new database connection.
4. In the database connection wizard, name the connection and create a new Database Login name, setting the user and password for HCL Domino.
5. On the Advanced tab for the connection wizard, set the additional connection string parameters as follows.
   • Add the JDBC keyword to the connection string.
   • Set MSTR_JDBC_JAR_FOLDER to the path of the directory containing the JAR file for the JDBC driver. (C:\Program Files\CData JDBC Driver for HCL Domino\lib\ on Windows.)
   • Set DRIVER to cdata.jdbc.domino.DominoDriver, the driver class.
   • Set URL to the JDBC URL for the HCL Domino driver, which contains the necessary connection properties.

     Connecting to Domino

     To connect to Domino data, set the following properties:

     • URL: The host name or IP of the server hosting the Domino database. Include the port of the server hosting the Domino database. For example: http://sampleserver:1234/
     • DatabaseScope: The name of a scope in the Domino Web UI. The driver exposes forms and views for the schema governed by the specified scope. In the Domino Admin UI, select the Scopes menu in the sidebar. Set this property to the name of an existing scope.

     Authenticating with Domino

     Domino supports authenticating via login credentials or an Azure Active Directory OAuth application:

     Login Credentials

     To authenticate with login credentials, set the following properties:

     • AuthScheme: Set this to "OAuthPassword"
     • User: The username of the authenticating Domino user
     • Password: The password associated with the authenticating Domino user

     The driver uses the login credentials to automatically perform an OAuth token exchange.

     AzureAD

     This authentication method uses Azure Active Directory as an IdP to obtain a JWT token. You need to create a custom OAuth application in Azure Active Directory and configure it as an IdP. To do so, follow the instructions in the Help documentation. Then set the following properties:

     • AuthScheme: Set this to "AzureAD"
     • InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH. You can use InitiateOAuth to avoid repeating the OAuth exchange and manually setting the OAuthAccessToken.
     • OAuthClientId: The Client ID obtained when setting up the custom OAuth application.
     • OAuthClientSecret: The Client secret obtained when setting up the custom OAuth application.
     • CallbackURL: The redirect URI defined when you registered your app. For example: https://localhost:33333
     • AzureTenant: The Microsoft Online tenant being used to access data. Supply either a value in the form companyname.microsoft.com or the tenant ID.

       The tenant ID is the same as the directory ID shown in the Azure Portal's Azure Active Directory > Properties page.

     Built-in Connection String Designer

     For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the HCL Domino JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

     java -jar cdata.jdbc.domino.jar

     Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

     When you configure the JDBC URL, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

   Typical additional connection string properties follow:

   JDBC;MSTR_JDBC_JAR_FOLDER=PATH\TO\JAR\;DRIVER=cdata.jdbc.domino.DominoDriver;URL={jdbc:domino:Server=https://domino.corp.com;AuthScheme=OAuthPassword;User=my_domino_user;Password=my_domino_password;};
6. Ensure that you have not selected an ODBC data source (this will trigger MicroStrategy to use the additional connection string parameters to build the database instance) and click OK.
7. Click OK to close the database instance wizard.
8. In the Project Source, right-click the project and open the Project configuration.
9. Navigate to Database Instances, select the newly created database instance, and click OK.
10. Close MicroStrategy Developer and restart the connected MicroStrategy Intelligence Server to complete the database instance creation.

With the database instance configured, you will now be able to connect to HCL Domino data from the Warehouse Catalog and Data Import.

Connect to HCL Domino Data from the Warehouse Catalog

Once you have created a database instance based on the JDBC Driver for HCL Domino, you can connect to data from the Warehouse Catalog.

1. Select your project and click Schema -> Warehouse Catalog.
2. In the Read Settings for the Catalog, click Settings and set the queries to retrieve the schema:
   • To retrieve the list of tables, use the following query: SELECT * FROM SYS_TABLES
   • To retrieve the list of columns for selected tables, use the following query: SELECT DISTINCT CatalogName NAME_SPACE, TableName TAB_NAME, ColumnName COL_NAME, DataTypeName DATA_TYPE, Length DATA_LEN, NumericPrecision DATA_PREC, NumericScale DATA_SCALE FROM SYS_TABLECOLUMNS WHERE TableName IN (#TABLE_LIST#) ORDER BY 1,2,3
3. Select tables to be used in the project.

Using the CData JDBC Driver for HCL Domino in MicroStrategy, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on HCL Domino data. Read our other articles on connecting to HCL Domino in MictroStrategy Web and connecting to HCL Domino in MicroStrategy Desktop for more information.

Note: Connecting using a JDBC Driver requires a 3- or 4-Tier Architecture.