Excel Spreadsheet Automation on ApprovalMax Data with the QUERY Formula

The CData Excel Add-In for ApprovalMax provides formulas that can query ApprovalMax data. The following three steps show how you can automate the following task: Search ApprovalMax data for a user-specified value and then organize the results into an Excel spreadsheet.

The syntax of the CDATAQUERY formula is the following:

=CDATAQUERY(Query, [Connection], [Parameters], [ResultLocation]);

This formula requires three inputs:

• Query: The declaration of the ApprovalMax data records you want to retrieve, written in standard SQL.

• Connection: Either the connection name, such as APIConnection1, or a connection string. The connection string consists of the required properties for connecting to ApprovalMax data, separated by semicolons.

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

  ApprovalMax API Profile Settings

  To authenticate to ApprovalMax and connect to your own data or to allow other users to connect to their data, the ApprovalMax Public API requires the OAuth 2.0 authorization code flow.

  First, you will need to register an OAuth application with ApprovalMax. Sign in to the ApprovalMax Developer Portal (https://developer.approvalmax.com/applications) and create a new application. Your OAuth application will be assigned a Client ID and a Client Secret, and you must register at least one Redirect URI (Callback URL).

  A Premium ApprovalMax subscription (or active trial) is required to use the Public API.

  After setting the following connection properties, 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 shown in your application settings on the ApprovalMax Developer Portal.
  • OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the Client Secret that is shown in your application settings on the ApprovalMax Developer Portal.
  • CallbackURL: Set this to the Redirect URI that is registered in your application settings.
  • Scope: (Optional) Override the default OAuth scopes. The default value openid offline_access https://www.approvalmax.com/scopes/public_api/read grants read-only access to all tables in this profile and enables refresh tokens. Use the principle of least privilege when narrowing this scope.

  The OAuth Authorization URL is https://identity.approvalmax.com/connect/authorize and the Token URL is https://identity.approvalmax.com/connect/token. Both authorization_code and refresh_token grant types are supported.

• ResultLocation: The cell that the output of results should start from.

Pass Spreadsheet Cells as Inputs to the Query

The procedure below results in a spreadsheet that organizes all the formula inputs in the first column.

1. Define cells for the formula inputs. In addition to the connection inputs, add another input to define a criterion for a filter to be used to search ApprovalMax data, such as CompanyId.
2. In another cell, write the formula, referencing the cell values from the user input cells defined above. Single quotes are used to enclose values such as addresses that may contain spaces.

=CDATAQUERY("SELECT * FROM UserProfiles WHERE CompanyId = '"&B7&"'","Profile="&B1&";AuthScheme="&B2&";InitiateOAuth="&B3&";OAuthClientId="&B4&";OAuthClientSecret="&B5&";CallbackURL="&B6&";Provider=API",B8)


3. Change the filter to change the data.