Connect to Act CRM Data in as an External Source in Dremio

The CData JDBC Driver for Act CRM implements JDBC Standards and allows various applications, including Dremio, to work with live Act CRM data. Dremio is a data lakehouse platform designed to empower self-service, interactive analytics on the data lake. With the CData JDBC Driver, you can include live Act CRM data as a part of your enterprise data lake. This article describes how to connect to Act CRM data from Dremio as an External Source.

The CData JDBC Driver enables high-speed access to live Act CRM data in Dremio. Once you install the driver, authenticate with Act CRM and gain immediate access to Act CRM data within your data lake. By surfacing Act CRM data using native data types and handling complex filters, aggregations, & other operations automatically, the CData JDBC Driver grants seamless access to Act CRM data.

Build the ARP Connector

To use the CData JDBC Driver in Dremio, you need to build an Advanced Relation Pushdown (ARP) Connector. You can view the source code for the Connector on GitHub or download the ZIP file (GitHub.com) directly. Once you copy or extract the files, run the following command from the root directory of the connector (the directory containing the pom.xml file) to build the connector.

mvn clean install

Once the JAR file for the connector is built (in the target directory), you are ready to copy the ARP connector and JDBC Driver to your Dremio instance.

Installing the Connector and JDBC Driver

Install the ARP Connector to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/ and the JDBC Driver for Act CRM to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/3rdparty. You can use commands similar to the following:

ARP Connector

docker cp PATH\TO\dremio-actcrm-plugin-20.0.0.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/

JDBC Driver for Act CRM

docker cp PATH\TO\cdata.jdbc.actcrm.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/3rdparty/

Connecting to Act CRM

Act CRM will now appear as an External Source option in Dremio. The ARP Connector built uses a JDBC URL to connect to Act CRM data. The JDBC Driver has a built-in connection string designer that you can use (see below).

Built-in Connection String Designer

For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Act CRM JDBC Driver. Double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command line.

java -jar cdata.jdbc.actcrm.jar

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

The User and Password properties, under the Authentication section, must be set to valid Act! user credentials. In addition to the authentication values, see the following:

• Connecting to Act! Premium

  In addition to the authentication values, the URL to Act! is also required; for example https://eup1-iis-04.eu.hosted.act.com/.

  Additionally, you must specify the ActDatabase you will connect to. This is found by going to the About Act! Premium menu of your account, at the top right of the page, in the ? menu. Use the Database Name in the window that appears.

• Connecting to Act! Premium Cloud

  To connect to your Act! Premium Cloud account, you also need to specify the ActCloudName property. This property is found in the URL address of the Cloud account; for example https://eup1-iis-04.eu.hosted.act.com/ActCloudName/.

Note that retrieving ActCRM metadata can be expensive. It is advised that you set the CacheMetadata property to store the metadata locally.

NOTE: To use the JDBC Driver in Dremio, you will need a license (full or trial) and a Runtime Key (RTK). For more information on obtaining this license (or a trial), contact our sales team.

Add the Runtime Key (RTK) to the JDBC URL. You will end up with a JDBC URL similar to the following:

jdbc:actcrm:RTK=5246...;URL=https://myActCRMserver.com;User=myUser;Password=myPassword;ActDatabase=MyDB;

Access Act CRM as an External Source

To add Act CRM as an External Source, click to add a new source and select ActCRM. Copy the JDBC URL and paste it into the New ActCRM Source wizard.

Save the connection and you are ready to query live Act CRM data in Dremio, easily incorporating Act CRM data into your data lake.

More Information & Free Trial

Using the CData JDBC Driver for Act CRM in Dremio, you can incorporate live Act CRM data into your data lake. Check out our CData JDBC Driver for Act CRM page for more information about connecting to Act CRM. Download a free, 30 day trial of the CData JDBC Driver for Act CRM and get started today.