Analyze Mocean Data in R via JDBC
Access Mocean data with pure R script and standard SQL on any machine where R and Java can be installed. You can use the CData JDBC Driver for Mocean and the RJDBC package to work with remote Mocean 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 Mocean and visualize Mocean data by calling standard R functions.
Install R
You can match the driver's performance gains from multi-threading and managed code by running the multithreaded Microsoft R Open or by running open R linked with the BLAS/LAPACK libraries. This article uses Microsoft R Open 3.2.3, which is preconfigured to install packages from the Jan. 1, 2016 snapshot of the CRAN repository. This snapshot ensures reproducibility.
Load the RJDBC Package
To use the driver, download the RJDBC package. After installing the RJDBC package, the following line loads the package:
library(RJDBC)
Connect to Mocean as a JDBC Data Source
You will need the following information to connect to Mocean as a JDBC data source:
- Driver Class: Set this to cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver
- Classpath: Set this to the location of the driver JAR. By default this is the lib subfolder of the installation folder.
The DBI functions, such as dbConnect and dbSendQuery, provide a unified interface for writing data access code in R. Use the following line to initialize a DBI driver that can make JDBC requests to the CData JDBC Driver for Mocean:
driver <- JDBC(driverClass = "cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver", classPath = "MyInstallationDir\lib\cdata.jdbc.api.jar", identifier.quote = "'")
You can now use DBI functions to connect to Mocean and execute SQL queries. Initialize the JDBC connection with the dbConnect function.
Using API Key Authentication
Mocean uses API key authentication to control access to the API. To obtain an API Key:
- Log in to your Mocean account at https://dashboard.moceanapi.com
- Navigate to your account settings or API credentials section
- Copy your API Key
After obtaining your API Key, set the following connection properties:
- AuthScheme: Set this to APIKey.
- APIKey: Set this to your Mocean API Key. This is transmitted as a Bearer token in the Authorization header.
Example Connection String
Profile=C:\profiles\Mocean.apip;AuthScheme=APIKey;ProfileSettings='APIKey=your_api_key';
Connecting to Mocean
Once the authentication is configured, you can connect to Mocean and query data from any of the available tables such as AccountBalance, AccountPricing, MessageStatus, and NumberLookup.
Built-in Connection String Designer
For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Mocean 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.
Below is a sample dbConnect call, including a typical JDBC connection string:
conn <- dbConnect(driver,"jdbc:api:Profile=C:\profiles\Mocean.apip;AuthScheme=APIKey;ProfileSettings='APIKey=your_api_key';")
Schema Discovery
The driver models Mocean APIs as relational tables, views, and stored procedures. Use the following line to retrieve the list of tables:
dbListTables(conn)
Execute SQL Queries
You can use the dbGetQuery function to execute any SQL query supported by the Mocean API:
accountbalance <- dbGetQuery(conn,"SELECT , FROM AccountBalance WHERE = ''")
You can view the results in a data viewer window with the following command:
View(accountbalance)
Plot Mocean Data
You can now analyze Mocean 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(accountbalance$, main="Mocean AccountBalance", names.arg = accountbalance$, horiz=TRUE)
