Access Live Kafka Data in Excel (Desktop) through Connect Spreadsheets

Microsoft Excel is a widely used spreadsheet software application, primarily used for tasks related to data management, analysis, and visualization. When combined with Connect Spreadsheets by CData, you gain immediate access to Kafka data directly within Excel, facilitating data analysis, collaboration, calculations, and more. This article shows how to connect to Kafka in Connect Spreadsheets and access and update live Kafka data in Excel spreadsheets.

Connect Spreadsheets is the easiest way to get all your live data into Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets - no more downloading, wrangling, and uploading files again. Just connect to your data, select the dataset you'd like to see, and import it into your spreadsheet.

Configure Kafka Connectivity for Excel

Connectivity to Kafka from Excel is made possible through Connect Spreadsheets. To work with Kafka data from Excel, we start by creating and configuring a Kafka connection.

1. Log into Connect Spreadsheets, click Connections and click Add Connection
2. Select "Kafka" from the Add Connection panel
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Kafka.

   Set BootstrapServers and the Topic properties to specify the address of your Apache Kafka server, as well as the topic you would like to interact with.

   Authorization Mechanisms

   • SASL Plain: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Plain'.
   • SASL SSL: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Scram'. UseSSL should be set to true.
   • SSL: The SSLCert and SSLCertPassword properties should be specified. UseSSL should be set to true.
   • Kerberos: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Kerberos'.

   You may be required to trust the server certificate. In such cases, specify the TrustStorePath and the TrustStorePassword if necessary.

   
4. Click Create & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Kafka Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

With the connection configured, you are ready to connect to Kafka data from Excel.

Access Live Kafka Data in Excel

The steps below outline connecting to Connect Spreadsheets from Excel to access live Kafka data.

1. Open Excel, create a new sheet (or open an existing one).
2. Click Insert and click Get Add-ins. (if you have already installed the Add-In, jump to step 4).
3. Search for Connect Spreadsheets and install the Add-in.
4. Click Data and open the CData Connect Spreadsheets Add-In.
5. In the Add-In panel, click "Log in" to authenticate with your Connect Spreadsheets account
6. In the Connect Spreadsheets panel in Excel, click Import
7. Choose a Connection (e.g. ApacheKafka1), Table (e.g. SampleTable_1), and Columns to import
8. Optionally add Filters, Sorting, and a Limit
9. Click Execute to import the data and opt to overwrite the existing sheet or create a new one.

Update Kafka Data from Excel

In addition to viewing Kafka data in Excel, Connect Spreadsheets also lets you update and delete Kafka data. Begin by importing data (as described above).

1. Update any cell or cells with changes you want to push to Kafka (your changes will be in red)
2. In the Connect Spreadsheets Add-In panel, select Update
3. Optionally highlight the cell(s) you wish to update and select an update option ("Update All" or "Update Selected")
4. Click Execute to push the updates to Kafka

A notification will appear when the update is complete

Live Access to Kafka Data from Spreadsheet Apps

New, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live Kafka data from your Excel workbook. You can add more data to your workbook for calculations, aggregations, collaboration, and more.

Try Connect Spreadsheets and get real-time data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from Microsoft Excel.