Connect to Excel Online Data in as an External Source in Dremio

The CData JDBC Driver for Excel Online implements JDBC Standards and allows various applications, including Dremio, to work with live Excel Online data. Dremio is a data lakehouse platform designed to empower self-service, interactive analytics on the data lake. With the CData JDBC Driver, you can include live Excel Online data as a part of your enterprise data lake. This article describes how to connect to Excel Online data from Dremio as an External Source.

The CData JDBC Driver enables high-speed access to live Excel Online data in Dremio. Once you install the driver, authenticate with Excel Online and gain immediate access to Excel Online data within your data lake. By surfacing Excel Online data using native data types and handling complex filters, aggregations, & other operations automatically, the CData JDBC Driver grants seamless access to Excel Online data.

Build the ARP Connector

To use the CData JDBC Driver in Dremio, you need to build an Advanced Relation Pushdown (ARP) Connector. You can view the source code for the Connector on GitHub or download the ZIP file (GitHub.com) directly. Once you copy or extract the files, run the following command from the root directory of the connector (the directory containing the pom.xml file) to build the connector.

mvn clean install

Once the JAR file for the connector is built (in the target directory), you are ready to copy the ARP connector and JDBC Driver to your Dremio instance.

Installing the Connector and JDBC Driver

Install the ARP Connector to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/ and the JDBC Driver for Excel Online to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/3rdparty. You can use commands similar to the following:

ARP Connector

docker cp PATH\TO\dremio-excelonline-plugin-20.0.0.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/

JDBC Driver for Excel Online

docker cp PATH\TO\cdata.jdbc.excelonline.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/3rdparty/

Connecting to Excel Online

Excel Online will now appear as an External Source option in Dremio. The ARP Connector built uses a JDBC URL to connect to Excel Online data. The JDBC Driver has a built-in connection string designer that you can use (see below).

Built-in Connection String Designer

For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Excel Online JDBC Driver. Double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command line.

java -jar cdata.jdbc.excelonline.jar

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

You can connect to a workbook by providing authentication to Excel Online and then setting the following properties:

• Workbook: Set this to the name or Id of the workbook.

  If you want to view a list of information about the available workbooks, execute a query to the Workbooks view after you authenticate.

• UseSandbox: Set this to true if you are connecting to a workbook in a sandbox account. Otherwise, leave this blank to connect to a production account.

You use the OAuth authentication standard to authenticate to Excel Online. See the Getting Started section in the help documentation for a guide. Getting Started also guides you through executing SQL to worksheets and ranges.

NOTE: To use the JDBC Driver in Dremio, you will need a license (full or trial) and a Runtime Key (RTK). For more information on obtaining this license (or a trial), contact our sales team.

Add the Runtime Key (RTK) to the JDBC URL. You will end up with a JDBC URL similar to the following:

jdbc:excelonline:RTK=5246...;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH

Access Excel Online as an External Source

To add Excel Online as an External Source, click to add a new source and select ExcelOnline. Copy the JDBC URL and paste it into the New ExcelOnline Source wizard.

Save the connection and you are ready to query live Excel Online data in Dremio, easily incorporating Excel Online data into your data lake.

More Information & Free Trial

Using the CData JDBC Driver for Excel Online in Dremio, you can incorporate live Excel Online data into your data lake. Check out our CData JDBC Driver for Excel Online page for more information about connecting to Excel Online. Download a free, 30 day trial of the CData JDBC Driver for Excel Online and get started today.