Query SQL Analysis Services Data in DataGrip

DataGrip is a database IDE that allows SQL developers to query, create, and manage databases. When paired with the CData JDBC Driver for SQL Analysis Services, DataGrip can work with live SQL Analysis Services data. This article shows how to establish a connection to SQL Analysis Services data in DataGrip.

Create a New Driver Definition for SQL Analysis Services

The steps below describe how to create a new Data Source in DataGrip for SQL Analysis Services.

1. In DataGrip, click File -> New > Project and name the project
2. In the Database Explorer, click the plus icon () and select Driver.
3. In the Driver tab:
   • Set Name to a user-friendly name (e.g. "CData SQL Analysis Services Driver")
   • Set Driver Files to the appropriate JAR file. To add the file, click the plus (), select "Add Files," navigate to the "lib" folder in the driver's installation directory and select the JAR file (e.g. cdata.jdbc.ssas.jar).
   • Set Class to cdata.jdbc.ssas.SSAS.jar
   Additionally, in the advanced tab you can change driver properties and some other settings like VM Options, VM environment, VM home path, DBMS, etc
   • For most cases, change the DBMS type to "Unknown" in Expert options to avoid native SQL Server queries (Transact-SQL), which might result in an invalid function error
4. Click "Apply" then "OK" to save the Connection

Configure a Connection to SQL Analysis Services

1. Once the connection is saved, click the plus (), then "Data Source" then "CData SQL Analysis Services Driver" to create a new SQL Analysis Services Data Source.
2. In the new window, configure the connection to SQL Analysis Services with a JDBC URL.

   Built-in Connection String Designer

   For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the SQL Analysis Services JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

   java -jar cdata.jdbc.ssas.jar

   Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

   To connect, provide authentication and set the Url property to a valid SQL Server Analysis Services endpoint. You can connect to SQL Server Analysis Services instances hosted over HTTP with XMLA access. See the Microsoft documentation to configure HTTP access to SQL Server Analysis Services.

   To secure connections and authenticate, set the corresponding connection properties, below. The data provider supports the major authentication schemes, including HTTP and Windows, as well as SSL/TLS.

   • HTTP Authentication

     Set AuthScheme to "Basic" or "Digest" and set User and Password. Specify other authentication values in CustomHeaders.

   • Windows (NTLM)

     Set the Windows User and Password and set AuthScheme to "NTLM".

   • Kerberos and Kerberos Delegation

     To authenticate with Kerberos, set AuthScheme to NEGOTIATE. To use Kerberos delegation, set AuthScheme to KERBEROSDELEGATION. If needed, provide the User, Password, and KerberosSPN. By default, the data provider attempts to communicate with the SPN at the specified Url.

   • SSL/TLS:

     By default, the data provider attempts to negotiate SSL/TLS by checking the server's certificate against the system's trusted certificate store. To specify another certificate, see the SSLServerCert property for the available formats.

   You can then access any cube as a relational table: When you connect the data provider retrieves SSAS metadata and dynamically updates the table schemas. Instead of retrieving metadata every connection, you can set the CacheLocation property to automatically cache to a simple file-based store.

   See the Getting Started section of the CData documentation, under Retrieving Analysis Services Data, to execute SQL-92 queries to the cubes.

3. Set URL to the connection string, e.g., jdbc:ssas:User=myuseraccount;Password=mypassword;URL=http://localhost/OLAP/msmdpump.dll;
4. Click "Apply" and "OK" to save the connection string

At this point, you will see the data source in the Data Explorer.

Execute SQL Queries Against SQL Analysis Services

To browse through the SQL Analysis Services entities (available as tables) accessible through the JDBC Driver, expand the Data Source.

To execute queries, right click on any table and select "New" -> "Query Console."

In the Console, write the SQL query you wish to execute. For example: SELECT Fiscal_Year, Sales_Amount FROM Adventure_Works

Download a free, 30-day trial of the CData JDBC Driver for SQL Analysis Services and start working with your live SQL Analysis Services data in DataGrip. Reach out to our Support Team if you have any questions.