Visualize Printful Data in Tableau Desktop (through CData Connect)

Tableau is a visual analytics platform transforming the way businesses use data to solve problems. When paired with CData Connect (or Connect Server), you can easily get access to live Printful data within Tableau.

CData Connect Server provides a pure SQL Server interface for Printful, allowing you to easily build reports from live Printful data in Tableau Desktop — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. As you build visualizations, Tableau Desktop generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Server pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to Printful, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return the requested Printful data.

This article shows how to create a virtual SQL Server database for Printful, connect to the virtual database in Tableau, and build a simple chart.

Create a Virtual SQL Server Database for Printful Data

CData Connect Server uses a straightforward, point-and-click interface to connect to data sources and generate APIs.

1. Login to Connect Server and click Connections.
2. Select "Printful" from Available Data Sources.
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Printful.

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

   Printful API Profile Settings

   In order to authenticate to Printful, you'll need to provide your API Key. To get your API Key, first go to 'Settings' then 'Stores'. Select the Store you would like to connect to, then click the 'Add API Access' button to generate an API Key. Set the API Key in the ProfileSettings property to connect.

4. Click Save Changes
5. Click Privileges -> Add and add the new user (or an existing user) with the appropriate permissions.

With the virtual database created, you are ready to connect to Printful data from Tableau Desktop.

Visualize Live Printful Data in Tableau Desktop

The steps below outline connecting to the virtual Printful database in CData Connect and building a simple visualization from the data.

1. Open Tableau and click "Microsoft SQL Server" under Connect -> To a Server.
2. In the connection wizard, enter the values for your CData Connect instance and click "Sign In"
   • Server: the address of your Connect instance and port of the TDS endpoint, separated by a comma (default port is: 1433)
   • Database: the virtual database you configured for the Printful data
   • Username & Password: the credentials for a CData Connect user
3. Select your newly created database and the table(s) you wish to visualize (defining relationships for JOINed tables as needed).
4. Select Dimensions and Measures and configure your visualization.

SQL Access to Printful Data from On-Premise Applications

At this point, you have a direct connection to live Printful data from your Tableau Desktop workbook. You can create new visualizations, build dashboards, and more. For more information on gaining SQL access to data from more than 200 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources (including Printful) from desktop applications like Tableau refer to our CData Connect page or download a free trial.