Learn more
 

Ready to get started?

Download a free trial of the LinkedIn ODBC Driver to get started:

 Download Now

Learn more:

LinkedIn Icon LinkedIn ODBC Driver

The LinkedIn ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from LinkedIn, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.

With the LinkedIn ODBC Driver accessing live People, Profiles, Companies, Groups, Jobs, etc. is as easy as querying a database.

In this article

Related articles

Replicate LinkedIn Data from PowerShell


Write a quick PowerShell script to query LinkedIn data. Use connectivity to the live data to replicate LinkedIn data to SQL Server.



The CData ODBC Driver for LinkedIn enables out-of-the-box integration with Microsoft's built-in support for ODBC. The ODBC driver instantly integrates connectivity to the real LinkedIn data with PowerShell.

You can use the .NET Framework Provider for ODBC built into PowerShell to quickly automate integration tasks like replicating LinkedIn data to other databases. This article shows how to replicate LinkedIn data to SQL Server in 5 lines of code.

You can also write PowerShell code to execute create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) operations. See the examples below.

Create an ODBC Data Source for LinkedIn

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

LinkedIn uses the OAuth 2 authentication standard. You will need to obtain the OAuthClientId and OAuthClientSecret by registering an app with LinkedIn. For more information refer to our authentication guide.

Connect to LinkedIn

The code below shows how to use the DSN to initialize the connection to LinkedIn data in PowerShell:

$conn = New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcConnection $conn.ConnectionString = "DSN=CData LinkedIn Source x64"

Back Up LinkedIn Data to SQL Server

After you enable caching, you can use the code below to replicate data to SQL Server.

Set the following connection properties to configure the caching database:

  • CacheProvider: The name of the ADO.NET provider. This can be found in the Machine.config for your version of .NET. For example, to configure SQL Server, enter System.Data.SqlClient.

  • CacheConnection: The connection string of properties required to connect to the database. Below is an example for SQL Server:

    Server=localhost;Database=RSB;User Id=sqltest;Password=sqltest;

The SQL query in the example can be used to refresh the entire cached table, including its schema. Any already existing cache is deleted.

$conn.Open() # Create and execute the SQL Query $SQL = "CACHE DROP EXISTING SELECT * FROM " + $CompanyStatusUpdates $cmd = New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcCommand($sql,$conn) $count = $cmd.ExecuteNonQuery() $conn.Close()

The driver gives you complete control over the caching functionality. See the help documentation for more caching commands and usage examples. See the help documentation for steps to replicate to other databases.

Other Operations

To retrieve LinkedIn data in PowerShell, call the Fill method of the OdbcDataAdapter method. To execute data manipulation commands, initialize the OdbcCommand object and then call ExecuteNonQuery. Below are some more examples CRUD commands to LinkedIn through the .NET Framework Provider for ODBC:

Retrieve LinkedIn Data

$sql="SELECT VisibilityCode, Comment from CompanyStatusUpdates" $da= New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcDataAdapter($sql, $conn) $dt= New-Object System.Data.DataTable $da.Fill($dt) $dt.Rows | foreach { $dt.Columns | foreach ($col in dt{ Write-Host $1[$_] } }

Update LinkedIn Data

$cmd = New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcCommand("UPDATE CompanyStatusUpdates SET EntityId='238' WHERE Id = @myId", $conn) $cmd.Parameters.Add(new System.Data.Odbc.OdbcParameter("myId","001d000000YBRseAAH") $cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()

Insert LinkedIn Data

$cmd = New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcCommand("INSERT INTO CompanyStatusUpdates SET EntityId='238' WHERE Id = @myId", $conn) $cmd.Parameters.Add(new System.Data.Odbc.OdbcParameter("myId","001d000000YBRseAAH") $cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()

Delete LinkedIn Data

$cmd = New-Object System.Data.Odbc.OdbcCommand("DELETE FROM CompanyStatusUpdates WHERE Id = @myid", $conn) $cmd.Parameters.Add(new System.Data.Odbc.OdbcParameter("myId","001d000000YBRseAAH") $cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()