Use the CData ODBC Driver for Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy Desktop

MicroStrategy is an analytics and mobility platform that enables data-driven innovation. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for Adobe Commerce, you gain database-like access to live Adobe Commerce data from MicroStrategy, expanding your reporting and analytics capabilities. In this article, we walk through adding Adobe Commerce as a data source in MicroStrategy Desktop and creating a simple visualization of Adobe Commerce data.

The CData ODBC Driver offers unmatched performance for interacting with live Adobe Commerce data in MicroStrategy due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from MicroStrategy to Adobe Commerce, the driver pushes supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Adobe Commerce and utilizes the embedded SQL Engine to process unsupported operations (often SQL functions and JOIN operations) client-side. With built-in dynamic metadata querying, you can visualize and analyze Adobe Commerce data using native MicroStrategy data types.

Connect to Adobe Commerce as an ODBC Data Source

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

Adobe Commerce uses the OAuth 1 authentication standard. To connect to the Adobe Commerce REST API, you will need to obtain values for the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties by registering an app with your Adobe Commerce system. See the "Getting Started" section in the help documentation for a guide to obtaining the OAuth values and connecting.

You will also need to provide the URL to your Adobe Commerce system. The URL depends on whether you are using the Adobe Commerce REST API as a customer or administrator.

• Customer: To use Adobe Commerce as a customer, make sure you have created a customer account in the Adobe Commerce homepage. To do so, click Account -> Register. You can then set the URL connection property to the endpoint of your Adobe Commerce system.

• Administrator: To access Adobe Commerce as an administrator, set CustomAdminPath instead. This value can be obtained in the Advanced settings in the Admin menu, which can be accessed by selecting System -> Configuration -> Advanced -> Admin -> Admin Base URL.

  If the Use Custom Admin Path setting on this page is set to YES, the value is inside the Custom Admin Path text box; otherwise, set the CustomAdminPath connection property to the default value, which is "admin".

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 Adobe Commerce 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

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

Connect to and Visualize Adobe Commerce Data using MicroStrategy Desktop

In addition to connecting Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy enterprise products, you can connect to Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy Desktop. Follow the steps below to add Adobe Commerce data as a dataset and create visualizations and reports of Adobe Commerce data.

1. Open MicroStrategy Desktop and create a new dossier.
2. In the datasets panel, click New Data, select Databases, and select Type a Query as the Import Option.
3. Add a new data source and choose DSN data sources.
4. Choose the DSN you previously configured (likely CData Adobe Commerce Sys) and select Generic DBMS in the Version menu.
5. Set the User and Password properties for the DSN (or use placeholder values) and name the data source.
6. Select the new database instance to view the tables. You may need to manually click the search icon in the Available Tables section to see the tables.
7. Create a SQL query for the Adobe Commerce data (see below) and click Execute SQL to test the query. SELECT * FROM Products NOTE: Since we create a live connection, we can execute a SELECT * query and utilize the filtering and aggregation features native to the MicroStrategy products.
8. Click Finish and choose to connect live.
9. Choose a visualization, choose fields to display (data types are discovered automatically through dynamic metadata discovery) and apply any filters to create a new visualization of Adobe Commerce data. Where possible, the complex queries generated by the filters and aggregations will be pushed down to Adobe Commerce, while any unsupported operations (which can include SQL functions and JOIN operations) will be managed client-side by the CData SQL Engine embedded in the driver.
10. Once you are finished configuring the dossier, click File -> Save.

Using the CData ODBC Driver for Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy Desktop, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on Adobe Commerce data. Read our other articles on connecting to Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy and connecting to Adobe Commerce in MicroStrategy Web for more examples.