Connect to Hugging Face Data in Ruby

The CData API Driver for ODBC makes it easy to integrate connectivity to live Hugging Face data in Ruby. This article shows how to create a simple Ruby app that connects to Hugging Face data, executes a query, and displays the results.

Create an ODBC Connection to Hugging Face Data

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.

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:

1. Log in to your HuggingFace account at https://huggingface.co
2. Navigate to Settings > Access Tokens
3. Click "New token" to create a new access token
4. Select the appropriate permissions (read or write)
5. 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';

Installing Ruby and Necessary Gems

If you do not have Ruby installed, refer to the Ruby installation page. With Ruby installed, you will need to install the ruby-dbi, dbd-odbc, and ruby-odbc gems:

gem install dbi
gem install dbd-odbc
gem install ruby-odbc

Create a Ruby App with Connectivity to Hugging Face Data

Create a new Ruby file (for example: APISelect.rb) and open it in a text editor. Copy the following code into your file:

#connect to the DSN
require 'dbi'
cnxn = DBI.connect('DBI:ODBC:CData API Source','','')

#execute a SELECT query and store the result set
resultSet = cnxn.execute("SELECT ,  FROM Collections WHERE  = ''")

#display the names of the columns
resultSet.column_names.each do |name|
  print name, "\t"
end
puts

#display the results
while row = resultSet.fetch do
  (0..resultSet.column_names.size - 1).each do |n|
    print row[n], "\t"
  end
  puts
end
resultSet.finish

#close the connection
cnxn.disconnect if cnxn

With the file completed, you are ready to display your Hugging Face data with Ruby. To do so, simply run your file from the command line:

ruby APISelect.rb

Writing SQL-92 queries to Hugging Face allows you to quickly and easily incorporate Hugging Face data into your own Ruby applications. Download a free trial today!