ETL JotForm in Oracle Data Integrator

Leverage existing skills by using the JDBC standard to connect to JotForm: Through drop-in integration into ETL tools like Oracle Data Integrator (ODI), the CData JDBC Driver for JotForm connects real-time JotForm data to your data warehouse, business intelligence, and Big Data technologies.

JDBC connectivity enables you to work with JotForm just as you would any other database in ODI. As with an RDBMS, you can use the driver to connect directly to the JotForm APIs in real time instead of working with flat files.

This article walks through a JDBC-based ETL -- JotForm to Oracle. After reverse engineering a data model of JotForm entities, you will create a mapping and select a data loading strategy -- since the driver supports SQL-92, this last step can easily be accomplished by selecting the built-in SQL to SQL Loading Knowledge Module.

Install the Driver

To install the driver, copy the driver JAR (cdata.jdbc.api.jar) and .lic file (cdata.jdbc.api.lic), located in the installation folder, into the ODI appropriate directory:

• UNIX/Linux without Agent: ~/.odi/oracledi/userlib
• UNIX/Linux with Agent: ~/.odi/oracledi/userlib and $ODI_HOME/odi/agent/lib
• Windows without Agent: %APPDATA%\Roaming\odi\oracledi\userlib
• Windows with Agent: %APPDATA%\odi\oracledi\userlib and %APPDATA%\odi\agent\lib

Restart ODI to complete the installation.

Reverse Engineer a Model

Reverse engineering the model retrieves metadata about the driver's relational view of JotForm data. After reverse engineering, you can query real-time JotForm data and create mappings based on JotForm tables.

1. In ODI, connect to your repository and click New -> Model and Topology Objects.
2. On the Model screen of the resulting dialog, enter the following information:
   • Name: Enter API.
   • Technology: Select Generic SQL (for ODI Version 12.2+, select Microsoft SQL Server).
   • Logical Schema: Enter API.
   • Context: Select Global.
3. On the Data Server screen of the resulting dialog, enter the following information:
   • Name: Enter API.
   • Driver List: Select Oracle JDBC Driver.
   • Driver: Enter cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver
   • URL: Enter the JDBC URL containing the connection string.

     Start by setting the Profile connection property to the location of the JotForm Profile on disk (e.g. C:\profiles\JotForm.apip). Next, set the ProfileSettings connection property to the connection string for JotForm (see below).

     JotForm API Profile Settings

     You will need to find your JotForm API Key in order to authenticate. To obtain an API Key, go to 'My Account' > 'API Section' > 'Create a New API Key'. Once you've created your new API Key, you can set it in the ProfileSettings connection property.

     Custom Enterprise API Domains

     Enterprise customers of JotForm are given custom API domains to connect to, rather than the default 'api.jotform.com' domain. If you are an enterprise JotForm customer, then set Domain to you custom API hostname, such as 'your-domain.com' or 'subdomain.jotform.com', inside the ProfileSettings connection property. Conversely, if you do not have a custom domain and still need to connect to 'api.jotform.com', then leave Domain undefined and set only APIKey.

     Built-in Connection String Designer

     For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the JotForm 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.

     Below is a typical connection string:

     jdbc:api:Profile=C:\profiles\JotForm.apip;ProfileSettings='APIKey=my_api_key;Domain=my_custom_domain';
4. On the Physical Schema screen, enter the following information:
   • Name: Select from the Drop Down menu.
   • Database (Catalog): Enter CData.
   • Owner (Schema): If you select a Schema for JotForm, enter the Schema selected, otherwise enter API.
   • Database (Work Catalog): Enter CData.
   • Owner (Work Schema): If you select a Schema for JotForm, enter the Schema selected, otherwise enter API.
5. In the opened model click Reverse Engineer to retrieve the metadata for JotForm tables.

Edit and Save JotForm Data

After reverse engineering you can now work with JotForm data in ODI. To view JotForm data, expand the Models accordion in the Designer navigator, right-click a table, and click View data.

Create an ETL Project

Follow the steps below to create an ETL from JotForm. You will load Forms entities into the sample data warehouse included in the ODI Getting Started VM.

1. Open SQL Developer and connect to your Oracle database. Right-click the node for your database in the Connections pane and click new SQL Worksheet.

   Alternatively you can use SQLPlus. From a command prompt enter the following:

   sqlplus / as sysdba
2. Enter the following query to create a new target table in the sample data warehouse, which is in the ODI_DEMO schema. The following query defines a few columns that match the Forms table in JotForm: CREATE TABLE ODI_DEMO.TRG_FORMS (TITLE NUMBER(20,0),Id VARCHAR2(255));
3. In ODI expand the Models accordion in the Designer navigator and double-click the Sales Administration node in the ODI_DEMO folder. The model is opened in the Model Editor.
4. Click Reverse Engineer. The TRG_FORMS table is added to the model.
5. Right-click the Mappings node in your project and click New Mapping. Enter a name for the mapping and clear the Create Empty Dataset option. The Mapping Editor is displayed.
6. Drag the TRG_FORMS table from the Sales Administration model onto the mapping.
7. Drag the Forms table from the JotForm model onto the mapping.
8. Click the source connector point and drag to the target connector point. The Attribute Matching dialog is displayed. For this example, use the default options. The target expressions are then displayed in the properties for the target columns.
9. Open the Physical tab of the Mapping Editor and click FORMS_AP in TARGET_GROUP.
10. In the FORMS_AP properties, select LKM SQL to SQL (Built-In) on the Loading Knowledge Module tab.

You can then run the mapping to load JotForm data into Oracle.