Integrating LlamaIndex with Microsoft Entra ID Data via CData Connect AI
LlamaIndex is a data framework for building LLM applications — agents, RAG pipelines, and structured workflows that reason over external data. By integrating LlamaIndex with CData Connect AI through the built-in MCP Server, your agents can discover and query live Microsoft Entra ID data as native tools without writing custom connectors.
CData Connect AI offers a secure, low-code environment to connect Microsoft Entra ID and other data sources, removing the need for complex ETL and enabling seamless automation across business applications with live data.
This article outlines how to configure Microsoft Entra ID connectivity in CData Connect AI, register the MCP server with LlamaIndex, and build a ReAct agent that queries Microsoft Entra ID data in real time.
Prerequisites
- An account in CData Connect AI
- Python version 3.10 or higher, to install the LlamaIndex packages
- Generate and save an OpenAI API key
- Install Visual Studio Code in your system
Step 1: Configure Microsoft Entra ID Connectivity for LlamaIndex
Before LlamaIndex can access Microsoft Entra ID, a Microsoft Entra ID connection must be created in CData Connect AI. This connection is then exposed to LlamaIndex through the remote MCP server.
- Log in to Connect AI, click Sources, and then click + Add Connection
- From the available data sources, choose Microsoft Entra ID
-
Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Microsoft Entra ID
Microsoft Entra ID uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate using OAuth, create an app to obtain the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties. See the OAuth section in the Help documentation for an authentication guide.
- Click Save & Test
- Once authenticated, open the Permissions tab in the Microsoft Entra ID connection and configure user-based permissions as required
Generate a Personal Access Token (PAT)
LlamaIndex authenticates to Connect AI using an account email and a Personal Access Token (PAT). Creating separate PATs for each integration is recommended to maintain access control granularity.
- In Connect AI, select the Gear icon in the top-right to open Settings
- Under Access Tokens, select Create PAT
- Provide a descriptive name for the token and select Create
- Copy the token and store it securely. The PAT will only be visible during creation
With the Microsoft Entra ID connection configured and a PAT generated, LlamaIndex is prepared to connect to Microsoft Entra ID data through the CData MCP server.
Step 2: Connect to the MCP server in LlamaIndex
To connect LlamaIndex with CData Connect AI Remote MCP Server and use OpenAI for reasoning, configure your MCP server endpoint and authentication in a
config.pyfile. These values let LlamaIndex’s MCP tool spec call the MCP server tools, while OpenAI handles the natural language reasoning.
- Create a folder for the LlamaIndex MCP project
- Create two Python files within the folder:
config.py
andllamaindex_agent.py
- In
config.py
, define your MCP server URL and your Base64-encoded CData Connect AI email and PAT (obtained in the prerequisites):class Config: MCP_BASE_URL = "https://mcp.cloud.cdata.com/mcp" # MCP Server URL MCP_AUTH = "base64encoded(EMAIL:PAT)" # Base64 encoded Connect AI Email:PATNote: You can create the base64 encoded version of MCP_AUTH using any Base64 encoding tool.
- In
llamaindex_agent.py
, wire up the MCP tool spec and a ReAct agent:""" Integrates a LlamaIndex ReAct agent with the CData Connect AI MCP server. The script discovers MCP tools, wraps them as LlamaIndex tools, and runs an agent loop driven by OpenAI for reasoning. """ import asyncio from llama_index.tools.mcp import BasicMCPClient, McpToolSpec from llama_index.core.agent.workflow import ReActAgent from llama_index.llms.openai import OpenAI from config import Config async def main(): # Initialize the MCP client pointed at Connect AI mcp_client = BasicMCPClient( Config.MCP_BASE_URL, headers={"Authorization": f"Basic {Config.MCP_AUTH}"}, ) # Discover tools the MCP server exposes (getCatalogs, queryData, etc.) tool_spec = McpToolSpec(client=mcp_client) tools = await tool_spec.to_tool_list_async() print("Discovered MCP tools:", [t.metadata.name for t in tools]) # Configure the LLM that drives the ReAct loop llm = OpenAI( model="gpt-4o", temperature=0.2, api_key="YOUR_OPENAI_API_KEY", # https://platform.openai.com/ ) # Build the agent with the MCP-backed tools agent = ReActAgent(tools=tools, llm=llm) user_prompt = "How many tables are available in AzureAD1?" # Change as needed print(f" User prompt: {user_prompt}") response = await agent.run(user_prompt) print("Agent final response:", response) if __name__ == "__main__": asyncio.run(main())
Step 3: Install the LlamaIndex packages
Since this workflow uses LlamaIndex together with the CData Connect AI MCP server and OpenAI for reasoning, install the required Python packages.
Run the following command in your project terminal:
pip install llama-index llama-index-tools-mcp llama-index-llms-openai
Step 4: Prompt Microsoft Entra ID using LlamaIndex (via the MCP server)
- When the installation finishes, run
python llamaindex_agent.py
to execute the script - The script connects to the MCP server and discovers the CData Connect AI MCP tools available for querying your connected data
- Supply a prompt (e.g., "How many tables are available in Microsoft Entra ID?")
- The agent reasons over the available tools, calls
queryData
against Microsoft Entra ID, and responds with the result
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