Connect to Live Certinia Data in MicroStrategy through CData Connect AI

MicroStrategy is an analytics and mobility platform that enables data-driven innovation. When you pair MicroStrategy with CData Connect AI, you gain database-like access to live Certinia data from MicroStrategy, expanding your reporting and analytics capabilities. In this article, we walk through connecting to Certinia in Connect AI and connecting to Connect AI in MicroStrategy to create a simple visualization of Certinia data.

As a cloud-based integration platform, Connect AI is ideal for working with cloud-based BI and analytics tools. With no servers to configure or data proxies to set up, you can simply use the web-based UI to create a live connection to Certinia and connect from MicroStrategy to start performing analytics based on live Certinia data.

Configure Certinia Connectivity for Microstrategy

Connectivity to Certinia from Microstrategy is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with Certinia data from Microstrategy, we start by creating and configuring a Certinia connection.

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection

2. Select "Certinia" from the Add Connection panel

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Certinia.

   There are several authentication methods available for connecting to Certinia: login credentials, SSO, and OAuth.

   Authenticating with a Login and Token

   Set the User and Password to your login credentials. Additionally, set the SecurityToken. By default, the SecurityToken is required, but you can make it optional by allowing a range of trusted IP addresses.

   To disable the security token:

   1. Log in to Certinia and enter "Network Access" in the Quick Find box in the setup section.
   2. Add your IP address to the list of trusted IP addresses.

   To obtain the security token:

   1. Open the personal information page on certinia.com.
   2. Click the link to reset your security token. The token will be emailed to you.
   3. Specify the security token in the SecurityToken connection property or append it to the Password.

   Authenticating with OAuth

   If you do not have access to the user name and password or do not want to require them, use the OAuth user consent flow. See the OAuth section in the Help for an authentication guide.

   Connecting to Certinia Sandbox Accounts

   Set UseSandbox to true (false by default) to use a Certinia sandbox account. Ensure that you specify a sandbox user name in User.

   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Certinia Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect AI through the REST API, the OData API, or the Virtual SQL Server, a Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect AI. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each service to maintain granularity of access.

1. Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open the settings page.
2. On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
3. Give the PAT a name and click Create.
4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured and a PAT generated, you are ready to connect to Certinia data from MicroStrategy.

Connect to and Visualize Certinia Data Using MicroStrategy

You can connect to Certinia in MicroStrategy by adding a data source based on the native SQL Server functionality. Once you have created a data source, you can build dynamic visualizations of Certinia data in MicroStrategy.

1. Open MicroStrategy and select your account.
2. Click Add External Data, select Databases, and use Select Tables as the Import Option.
3. In the Import from Tables wizard, click to add a new Data Source.
4. Select "SQL Server" in the Database menu and select "SQL Server 2017" in the Version menu.
5. Sat the connection properties as follows:
   • Server Name: tds.cdata.com
   • Port Number: 14333
   • Database Name: the name of your Certinia connection (e.g. Certinia1)
   • User: a Connect AI user
   • Password: the PAT for your Connect AI user
   • Data Source Name: a name for the new external data source, like "CData Cloud Certinia"
6. Expand the menu for the new data source and choose "Edit Catalog Options"
7. Edit the "SQL statement retrieve columns ..." query to include TABLE_SCHEMA = '#?Schema_Name?#' in the WHERE clause, and click Apply and then OK (the complete query is below).
   
   

   SELECT DISTINCT 
     TABLE_SCHEMA NAME_SPACE, 
     TABLE_NAME TAB_NAME, 
     COLUMN_NAME COL_NAME, 
     (CASE 
       WHEN 
         (DATA_TYPE LIKE '%char' AND (CHARACTER_SET_NAME='utf8' OR CHARACTER_SET_NAME='usc2')) 
       THEN 
         CONCAT('a',DATA_TYPE) 
       ELSE 
         DATA_TYPE 
     END) DATA_TYPE, 
     CHARACTER_MAXIMUM_LENGTH DATA_LEN, 
     NUMERIC_PRECISION DATA_PREC, 
     NUMERIC_SCALE DATA_SCALE 
   FROM 
     INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS 
   WHERE 
     TABLE_NAME 
   IN 
     (#TABLE_LIST#) AND TABLE_SCHEMA='#?Schema_Name?#' 
   ORDER BY 
     1,2,3
   

8. Select the new data source and select the Namespace that corresponds to your virtual Certinia database (like Certinia1).
9. Drag tables into the pane to insert then. Note: Since we create a live connection, we can insert whole tables and utilize the filtering and aggregation features native to the MicroStrategy products to customize our datasets.
10. Click Finish, choose the option to connect live, save the query, and choose the option to create a new dossier. Live connections are possible and effective, thanks to high-performance data processing native to CData Connect AI.
11. Choose a visualization, choose fields to display, and apply any filters to create a new visualization of Certinia data. Data types are discovered automatically through dynamic metadata discovery. Where possible, the complex queries generated by the filters and aggregations will be pushed down to Certinia, while any unsupported operations (which can include SQL functions and JOIN operations) will be managed by the CData SQL engine embedded in Connect AI.
12. Once you have finished configuring the dossier, click File -> Save.

Using CData Connect AI with MicroStrategy, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on Certinia data. For more information on connecting to Certinia (and more than 100 other data sources), visit the Connect AI page. Sign up for a free trial and start working with live Certinia data in MicroStrategy.