Visualize Kafka Data in TIBCO Spotfire through ADO.NET

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Apache Kafka ADO.NET Provider

Rapidly create and deploy powerful .NET applications that integrate with Apache Kafka.



Integrate Kafka data into dashboards in TIBCO Spotfire.

This article walks you through using the CData ADO.NET Provider for Kafka in TIBCO Spotfire. You will establish a connection and create a simple dashboard.

  1. Add the CData ADO.NET data source by clicking Add Data Tables.
  2. Click Add -> Database.
  3. Select the provider and click Configure.
  4. Define the connection settings. Below is a typical connection string:

    User=admin;Password=pass;BootStrapServers=https://localhost:9091;Topic=MyTopic;

    Set BootstrapServers and the Topic properties to specify the address of your Apache Kafka server, as well as the topic you would like to interact with.

    Authorization Mechanisms

    • SASL Plain: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Plain'.
    • SASL SSL: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Scram'. UseSSL should be set to true.
    • SSL: The SSLCert and SSLCertPassword properties should be specified. UseSSL should be set to true.
    • Kerberos: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Kerberos'.

    You may be required to trust the server certificate. In such cases, specify the TrustStorePath and the TrustStorePassword if necessary.

    When you configure the connection, 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.

  5. Select the tables that you want to add to the dashboard. This example uses SampleTable_1. You can also specify an SQL query. The driver supports the standard SQL syntax.
  6. If you want to work with the live data, click the Keep Data Table External option. This option enables your dashboards to reflect changes to the data in real time.

    If you want to load the data into memory and process the data locally, click the Import Data Table option. This option is better for offline use or if a slow network connection is making your dashboard less interactive.

  7. After adding tables, the Recommended Visualizations wizard is displayed. When you select a table, Spotfire uses the column data types to detect number, time, and category columns. This example uses Column1 in the Numbers section and Id in the Categories section.

After adding several visualizations in the Recommended Visualizations wizard, you can make other modifications to the dashboard. For example, you can apply a filter: After clicking the Filter button, the available filters for each query are displayed in the Filters pane.