Access Hugging Face Data in Mule Applications Using the CData JDBC Driver
The CData API Driver for JDBC connects Hugging Face data to Mule applications enabling read functionality with familiar SQL queries. The JDBC Driver allows users to easily create Mule applications to backup, transform, report, and analyze Hugging Face data.
This article demonstrates how to use the CData API Driver for JDBC inside of a Mule project to create a Web interface for Hugging Face data. The application created allows you to request Hugging Face data using an HTTP request and have the results returned as JSON. The exact same procedure outlined below can be used with any CData JDBC Driver to create a Web interface for the hundreds of available data sources.
- Create a new Mule Project in Anypoint Studio.
- Add an HTTP Connector to the Message Flow.
- Configure the address for the HTTP Connector.

- Add a Database Select Connector to the same flow, after the HTTP Connector.
- Create a new Connection (or edit an existing one) and configure the properties.
- Set Connection to "Generic Connection"
- Select the CData JDBC Driver JAR file in the Required Libraries section (e.g. cdata.jdbc.api.jar).
- Set the URL to the connection string for Hugging Face
HuggingFace Hub uses token-based authentication to enable access to its API. The API provides access to machine learning models, datasets, spaces, papers, and other resources on the HuggingFace Hub platform.
Using API Key Authentication
To authenticate to HuggingFace Hub, you will need to provide an API Key (Access Token). To obtain your access token:
- Log in to your HuggingFace account at https://huggingface.co
- Navigate to Settings > Access Tokens
- Click "New token" to create a new access token
- Select the appropriate permissions (read or write)
- Copy the token value
After obtaining your access token, set the following connection properties:
- AuthScheme: Set this to APIKey.
- APIKey: Set this to your HuggingFace access token.
Example connection string
Profile=C:\profiles\HuggingFace.apip;ProfileSettings='APIKey=hf_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx';
Built-in Connection String Designer
For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Hugging Face JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.
java -jar cdata.jdbc.api.jar
Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.
- Set the Driver class name to cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver.
- Click Test Connection.
- Set the SQL Query Text to a SQL query to request Hugging Face data. For example:
SELECT , FROM Collections WHERE = ''
- Add a Transform Message Component to the flow.
- Set the Output script to the following to convert the payload to JSON:
%dw 2.0 output application/json --- payload
- To view your Hugging Face data, navigate to the address you configured for the HTTP Connector (localhost:8081 by default): http://localhost:8081. The Hugging Face data is available as JSON in your Web browser and any other tools capable of consuming JSON endpoints.
At this point, you have a simple Web interface for working with Hugging Face data (as JSON data) in custom apps and a wide variety of BI, reporting, and ETL tools. Download a free, 30 day trial of the JDBC Driver for Hugging Face and see the CData difference in your Mule Applications today.