NetSuite Reporting and Star Schemas in OBIEE

The CData ODBC Driver for NetSuite is a standard database driver that can integrate real-time access to NetSuite data into your data warehouse or directly into your reporting tool. This article shows how to bypass the data warehouse and import operational NetSuite data into Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE).

See the knowledge base for ODBC integrations with ETL tools like Informatica PowerCenter. For an ETL solution into Oracle Warehouse Builder, use the driver with the Oracle ODBC Gateway to Access NetSuite Data as a Remote Oracle Database.

Connect to NetSuite as an ODBC Data Source

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.

The User and Password properties, under the Authentication section, must be set to valid NetSuite user credentials. In addition, the AccountId must be set to the ID of a company account that can be used by the specified User. The RoleId can be optionally specified to log in the user with limited permissions.

See the "Getting Started" chapter of the help documentation for more information on connecting to NetSuite.

When you configure the DSN, 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.

Import NetSuite Metadata

Follow the steps below to use the OBIEE Client Tools to import NetSuite metadata into an OBIEE repository. You can then integrate NetSuite data into your business models.

1. Open the Administration Tool and click File -> New Repository.

2. In the Connection Type menu, select ODBC 3.5 and select the CData DSN.
3. Select the metadata types you want to import under the Relational Sources option and then select NetSuite tables.