Access Live Aha! Data in Excel (Desktop) through Connect Spreadsheets

Microsoft Excel is a widely used spreadsheet software application, primarily used for tasks related to data management, analysis, and visualization. When combined with Connect Spreadsheets by CData, you gain immediate access to Aha! data directly within Excel, facilitating data analysis, collaboration, calculations, and more. This article shows how to connect to Aha! in Connect Spreadsheets and access live Aha! data in Excel spreadsheets.

Connect Spreadsheets is the easiest way to get all your live data into Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets - no more downloading, wrangling, and uploading files again. Just connect to your data, select the dataset you'd like to see, and import it into your spreadsheet.

Configure Aha! Connectivity for Excel

Connectivity to Aha! from Excel is made possible through Connect Spreadsheets. To work with Aha! data from Excel, we start by creating and configuring a Aha! connection.

1. Log into Connect Spreadsheets, click Connections and click Add Connection
2. Select "Aha!" from the Add Connection panel
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Aha!.

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

   Aha! API Profile Settings

   The Aha! API uses OAuth-based authentication.

   You will first need to register an OAuth app with Aha!. This can be done from your Aha! account under 'Settings' > 'Personal' > 'Developer' > 'OAuth Applications'. Additionally, set the Domain, found in the domain name of your Aha account. For example if your Aha account is acmeinc.aha.io, then the Domain should be 'acmeinc'.

   After setting the following in the connection string, you are ready to connect:

   • AuthScheme: Set this to OAuth.
   • InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH. You can use InitiateOAuth to manage the process to obtain the OAuthAccessToken.
   • OAuthClientId: Set this to the client_id that is specified in you app settings.
   • OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the client_secret that is specified in you app settings.
   • CallbackURL: Set this to the Redirect URI you specified in your app settings.
   • Domain: Set this in the ProfileSettings to your Aha domain.
   
4. Click Create & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Aha! Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

With the connection configured, you are ready to connect to Aha! data from Excel.

Access Live Aha! Data in Excel

The steps below outline connecting to Connect Spreadsheets from Excel to access live Aha! data.

1. Open Excel, create a new sheet (or open an existing one).
2. Click Insert and click Get Add-ins. (if you have already installed the Add-In, jump to step 4).
3. Search for Connect Spreadsheets and install the Add-in.
4. Click Data and open the CData Connect Spreadsheets Add-In.
5. In the Add-In panel, click "Log in" to authenticate with your Connect Spreadsheets account
6. In the Connect Spreadsheets panel in Excel, click Import
7. Choose a Connection (e.g. API1), Table (e.g. Ideas), and Columns to import
8. Optionally add Filters, Sorting, and a Limit
9. Click Execute to import the data and opt to overwrite the existing sheet or create a new one.

Live Access to Aha! Data from Spreadsheet Apps

New, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live Aha! data from your Excel workbook. You can add more data to your workbook for calculations, aggregations, collaboration, and more.

Try Connect Spreadsheets and get real-time data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from Microsoft Excel.