How to connect PolyBase to Oracle Eloqua Reporting

PolyBase for SQL Server allows you to query external data by using the same Transact-SQL syntax used to query a database table. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for Oracle Eloqua Reporting, you get access to your Oracle Eloqua Reporting data directly alongside your SQL Server data. This article describes creating an external data source and external tables to grant access to live Oracle Eloqua Reporting data using T-SQL queries.

NOTE: PolyBase is only available on SQL Server 19 and above.

The CData ODBC drivers offer unmatched performance for interacting with live Oracle Eloqua Reporting data using PolyBase due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from SQL Server to Oracle Eloqua Reporting, the driver pushes down supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Oracle Eloqua Reporting and utilizes the embedded SQL engine to process unsupported operations (often SQL functions and JOIN operations) client-side. And with PolyBase, you can also join SQL Server data with Oracle Eloqua Reporting data, using a single query to pull data from distributed sources.

Connect to Oracle Eloqua Reporting

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs. To create an external data source in SQL Server using PolyBase, configure a System DSN (CData Oracle Eloqua Reporting Sys is created automatically).

Oracle Eloqua Reporting supports the following authentication methods:

• Basic authentication (User and Password)
• OAuth 2.0 code grant flow
• OAuth 2.0 password grant flow

Basic Authentication (User and Password)

To perform authentication with a user and password, specify these properties:

• AuthScheme: Basic.
• Company: The company name associated with your Oracle Eloqua Reporting account.
• User: Your login account name.
• Password: Your login password.

OAuth Authentication (Code Grant Flow)

To authenticate with the OAuth code grant flow, you must set AuthScheme to OAuth and create a custom OAuth application. For information about how to create a custom OAuth application, see the Help documentation.

Then set the following properties:

• InitiateOAuth: GETANDREFRESH. Used to automatically get and refresh the OAuthAccessToken.
• OAuthClientId: The client Id assigned when you registered your application.
• OAuthClientSecret: The client secret that was assigned when you registered your application.
• CallbackURL: The redirect URI that was defined when you registered your application.

When you connect, the driver opens Oracle Eloqua Reporting's OAuth endpoint in your default browser. Log in and grant permissions to the application. When the access token expires, the driver refreshes it automatically.

OAuth Authentication (Password Grant Flow)

With the OAuth password grant flow, you can use your OAuth application's credentials alongside your user credentials to authenticate without the need to grant permission manually via a browser prompt. You must create an OAuth app (see the Help documentation) to use this authentication method.

Set the following properties:

• AuthScheme: OAuthPassword
• Company: The company's unique identifier.
• User: Your login account name.
• Password: Your login password.
• OAuthClientId: The client Id assigned when you registered your custom OAuth application.
• OAuthClientSecret: The client secret assigned when you registered your custom OAuth application.

Click "Test Connection" to ensure that the DSN is connected to Oracle Eloqua Reporting properly. Navigate to the Tables tab to review the table definitions for Oracle Eloqua Reporting.

Create an External Data Source for Oracle Eloqua Reporting Data

After configuring the connection, you need to create a master encryption key and a credential database for the external data source.

Creating a Master Encryption Key

Execute the following SQL command to create a new master key, 'ENCRYPTION,' to encrypt the credentials for the external data source.

CREATE MASTER KEY ENCRYPTION BY PASSWORD = 'password';

Creating a Credential Database

Execute the following SQL command to create credentials for the external data source connected to Oracle Eloqua Reporting data.

NOTE: IDENTITY and SECRET correspond with the User and Password properties for Oracle Eloqua Reporting.

CREATE DATABASE SCOPED CREDENTIAL oracleeloquareporting_creds
WITH IDENTITY = 'oracleeloquareporting_username', SECRET = 'oracleeloquareporting_password';

Create an External Data Source for Oracle Eloqua Reporting

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE SQL command to create an external data source for Oracle Eloqua Reporting with PolyBase:

• Set the LOCATION parameter , using the DSN and credentials configured earlier.

For Oracle Eloqua Reporting, set SERVERNAME to the URL or address for your server (e.g. 'localhost' or '127.0.0.1' for local servers; the remote URL for remote servers). Leave PORT empty. PUSHDOWN is set to ON by default, meaning the ODBC Driver can leverage server-side processing for complex queries.

CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE cdata_oracleeloquareporting_source
WITH ( 
  LOCATION = 'odbc://SERVER_URL',
  CONNECTION_OPTIONS = 'DSN=CData Oracle Eloqua Reporting Sys',
  -- PUSHDOWN = ON | OFF,
  CREDENTIAL = oracleeloquareporting_creds
);

Create External Tables for Oracle Eloqua Reporting

After creating the external data source, use CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE statements to link to Oracle Eloqua Reporting data from your SQL Server instance. The table column definitions must match those exposed by the CData ODBC Driver for Oracle Eloqua Reporting. You can refer to the Tables tab of the DSN Configuration Wizard to see the table definition.

Sample CREATE TABLE Statement

The statement to create an external table based on a Oracle Eloqua Reporting would look similar to the following:

CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE (
   [nvarchar](255) NULL,
   [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  ...
) WITH ( 
  LOCATION='',
  DATA_SOURCE=cdata_oracleeloquareporting_source
);

Having created external tables for Oracle Eloqua Reporting in your SQL Server instance, you are now able to query local and remote data simultaneously. Thanks to built-in query processing in the CData ODBC Driver, you know that as much query processing as possible is being pushed to Oracle Eloqua Reporting, freeing up local resources and computing power. Download a free, 30-day trial of the ODBC Driver for Oracle Eloqua Reporting and start working with live Oracle Eloqua Reporting data alongside your SQL Server data today.