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Analyze LinkedIn Data in R via ODBC
Create data visualizations and use high-performance statistical functions to analyze LinkedIn data in Microsoft R Open.
Access LinkedIn data with pure R script and standard SQL. You can use the CData ODBC Driver for LinkedIn and the RODBC package to work with remote LinkedIn 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 LinkedIn data and visualize LinkedIn 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 LinkedIn as an ODBC Data Source
Information for connecting to LinkedIn follows, along with different instructions for configuring a DSN in Windows and Linux environments.
LinkedIn uses the OAuth 2 authentication standard. Obtain the OAuthClientId and OAuthClientSecret by registering an app with LinkedIn. For more information refer to our authentication guide.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 LinkedIn 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 LinkedIn Source]
Driver = CData ODBC Driver for LinkedIn
Description = My Description
OAuthClientId = MyOAuthClientId
OAuthClientSecret = MyOAuthClientSecret
CallbackURL = http://localhost:portNumber
CompanyId = XXXXXXX
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 LinkedIn Data as an ODBC Data Source
You can connect to a DSN in R with the following line:
conn <- odbcConnect("CData LinkedIn Source")
Schema Discovery
The driver models LinkedIn 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 LinkedIn API.
companystatusupdates <- sqlQuery(conn, "SELECT VisibilityCode, Comment FROM CompanyStatusUpdates", believeNRows=FALSE, rows_at_time=1)
You can view the results in a data viewer window with the following command:
View(companystatusupdates)
Plot LinkedIn Data
You can now analyze LinkedIn 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(companystatusupdates$Comment, main="LinkedIn CompanyStatusUpdates", names.arg = companystatusupdates$VisibilityCode, horiz=TRUE)
Ready to get started?
Download a free trial of the LinkedIn ODBC Driver to get started:
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LinkedIn ODBC Driver
The LinkedIn ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from LinkedIn, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.
With the LinkedIn ODBC Driver accessing live People, Profiles, Companies, Groups, Jobs, etc. is as easy as querying a database.
