Analyze Google Translate Data in R via ODBC

Access Google Translate data with pure R script and standard SQL. You can use the CData ODBC Driver for Google Translate and the RODBC package to work with remote Google Translate data in R. By using the CData Driver, you are leveraging a driver written for industry-proven standards to access your data in the popular, open-source R language. This article shows how to use the driver to execute SQL queries to Google Translate data and visualize Google Translate data in R.

Install R

You can complement the driver's performance gains from multi-threading and managed code by running the multithreaded Microsoft R Open or by running R linked with the BLAS/LAPACK libraries. This article uses Microsoft R Open (MRO).

Connect to Google Translate as an ODBC Data Source

Information for connecting to Google Translate follows, along with different instructions for configuring a DSN in Windows and Linux environments.

Authentication

Google Cloud Translation API requires OAuth 2.0 authentication to ensure secure access to translation services, datasets, glossaries, and adaptive MT resources. This authentication method allows you to securely connect to your Google Cloud project and manage translation resources with proper authorization.

OAuth 2.0 Setup and Configuration

Step 1: Create Google Cloud Project and Enable API

To set up OAuth authentication:

1. Visit the Google Cloud Console
2. Create a new project or select an existing project
3. Note down your Project ID (required for all API calls)
4. Navigate to "APIs & Services" > "Library"
5. Search for and enable the "Cloud Translation API"
6. Go to "APIs & Services" > "Credentials"
7. Click "Create Credentials" and select "OAuth Client ID"
8. Configure the OAuth consent screen if prompted
9. Select "Desktop application" or "Web application" as appropriate
10. Set the authorized redirect URI (CallbackURL)
11. Copy the Client ID and Client Secret for use in your connection

Required Connection Properties

• AuthScheme: Set this to OAuth (required)
• OAuthClientId: Client ID from Google Cloud Console (required)
• OAuthClientSecret: Client secret from Google Cloud Console (required)
• CallbackURL: Redirect URI specified in your OAuth application (required)
• InitiateOAuth: Set to GETANDREFRESH for automatic token management (recommended)
• ProjectId: Your Google Cloud project ID or project number (required for queries)

Required OAuth Scopes

The Google Cloud Translation API Profile requires the following OAuth scope:

• https://www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-translation - Full access to Cloud Translation API resources including translation, datasets, glossaries, and adaptive MT

When you configure the DSN, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

Windows

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.

Linux

If you are installing the CData ODBC Driver for Google Translate in a Linux environment, the driver installation predefines a system DSN. You can modify the DSN by editing the system data sources file (/etc/odbc.ini) and defining the required connection properties.

/etc/odbc.ini

[CData API Source]
Driver = CData ODBC Driver for Google Translate
Description = My Description
Profile = C:\profiles\GoogleTranslate.apip
AuthScheme = OAuth
InitiateOAuth = GETANDREFRESH
OAuthClientId = your_client_id
OAuthClientSecret = your_client_secret
CallbackUrl = your_callback_url

For specific information on using these configuration files, please refer to the help documentation (installed and found online).

Load the RODBC Package

To use the driver, download the RODBC package. In RStudio, click Tools -> Install Packages and enter RODBC in the Packages box.

After installing the RODBC package, the following line loads the package:

library(RODBC)

Note: This article uses RODBC version 1.3-12. Using Microsoft R Open, you can test with the same version, using the checkpoint capabilities of Microsoft's MRAN repository. The checkpoint command enables you to install packages from a snapshot of the CRAN repository, hosted on the MRAN repository. The snapshot taken Jan. 1, 2016 contains version 1.3-12.

library(checkpoint)
checkpoint("2016-01-01")

Connect to Google Translate Data as an ODBC Data Source

You can connect to a DSN in R with the following line:

conn <- odbcConnect("CData API Source")

Schema Discovery

The driver models Google Translate APIs as relational tables, views, and stored procedures. Use the following line to retrieve the list of tables:

sqlTables(conn)

Execute SQL Queries

Use the sqlQuery function to execute any SQL query supported by the Google Translate API.

supportedlanguages <- sqlQuery(conn, "SELECT LanguageCode, DisplayName FROM SupportedLanguages WHERE ProjectId = 'my-project-12345'", believeNRows=FALSE, rows_at_time=1)

You can view the results in a data viewer window with the following command:

View(supportedlanguages)

Plot Google Translate Data

You can now analyze Google Translate data with any of the data visualization packages available in the CRAN repository. You can create simple bar plots with the built-in bar plot function:

par(las=2,ps=10,mar=c(5,15,4,2))
barplot(supportedlanguages$DisplayName, main="Google Translate SupportedLanguages", names.arg = supportedlanguages$LanguageCode, horiz=TRUE)