Build FTP-Connected Dashboards in Redash

Redash lets you connect and query your data sources, build dashboards to visualize data and share them with your company. When paired with CData Connect Server, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to FTP data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to create a virtual database for FTP and build visualizations from FTP data in Redash.

CData Connect Server provides a pure SQL Server interface for FTP, allowing you to easily build reports from live FTP data in Redash — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. As you build visualizations, Redash generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Server pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to FTP, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return the requested FTP data.

Create a Virtual SQL Server Database for FTP Data

CData Connect Server uses a straightforward, point-and-click interface to connect to data sources and generate APIs.

1. Login to Connect Server and click Connections.
2. Select "FTP" from Available Data Sources.
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to FTP.

   To connect to FTP or SFTP servers, specify at least RemoteHost and FileProtocol. Specify the port with RemotePort.

   Set User and Password to perform Basic authentication. Set SSHAuthMode to use SSH authentication. See the Getting Started section of the data provider help documentation for more information on authenticating via SSH.

   Set SSLMode and SSLServerCert to secure connections with SSL.

   The data provider lists the tables based on the available folders in your FTP server. Set the following connection properties to control the relational view of the file system:

   • RemotePath: Set this to the current working directory.
   • TableDepth: Set this to control the depth of folders to list as views.
   • FileRetrievalDepth: Set this to retrieve and list files recursively from the root table.

   Stored Procedures are available to download files, upload files, and send protocol commands. See the Data Model chapter of the FTP data provider documentation for more information.

4. Click Save Changes
5. Click Privileges -> Add and add the new user (or an existing user) with the appropriate permissions.

With the virtual database created, you are ready to connect to FTP data from Redash.

Visualize FTP Data in Redash

The steps below outline creating a new data source in Redash based on the virtual FTP database in Connect Server and building a simple visualization from the data.

Create a New Data Source

1. Log into Redash, click on your profile and click "Data Sources"
2. Click the " New Data Source" button
3. Select "Microsoft SQL Server" as the Data Source Type
4. On the configuration tab, set the following properties:
   • Name: Name the data source (e.g. FTP (CData Connect))
   • Host: The full URL to your CData Connect instance (e.g. https://connect_server_url)
   • Port: The port of the CData Connect SQL Server endpoint (e.g. 1433)
   • User: A CData Connect user
   • Password: The password for the above user
   • Database name: The name of the virtual database for FTP (e.g. FTP1)
   • Click the checkbox to Use SSQL
5. Click Create
6. Click the "Test Connection" button to ensure you have configured the connection properly

With the new Data Source created, we are ready to visualize our FTP data.

Create a FTP Data Visualization

1. Click Create -> New Query
2. Select the newly created Data Source (you can explore the data structure in the New Query wizard)
3. Write a SQL statement to retrieve the data, for example:
   SELECT Filesize, Filename FROM MyDirectory
4. Click the "Execute" button to load FTP data into Redash via CData Connect
5. Use the Visualization Editor to create and analyze graphs from FTP data
6. You can schedule the query to refresh and update the visualization periodically

SQL Access to FTP Data from Cloud Applications

At this point, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to FTP data from Redash. You can create new visualizations, build dashboards, and more. For more information on gaining SQL access to data from more than 100 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources from cloud applications like Redash, refer to our Connect Server page.