Viewing Microsoft Planner Data in RAD Studio Data Explorer

Embarcadero RAD Studio provides a development environment for Delphi and C++Builder applications. With the CData ODBC Driver for Microsoft Planner, you gain access to live Microsoft Planner data within RAD Studio, abstracting the data into tables, views, and stored procedures that can be used to both retrieve and update Microsoft Planner data. This article will walk through connecting to Microsoft Planner using the Data Explorer.

Configure a Connection to Microsoft Planner

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.

You can connect without setting any connection properties for your user credentials. Below are the minimum connection properties required to connect.

• InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH. You can use InitiateOAuth to avoid repeating the OAuth exchange and manually setting the OAuthAccessToken.
• Tenant (optional): Set this if you wish to authenticate to a different tenant than your default. This is required to work with an organization not on your default Tenant.

When you connect the Driver opens the MS Planner OAuth endpoint in your default browser. Log in and grant permissions to the Driver. The Driver then completes the OAuth process.

1. Extracts the access token from the callback URL and authenticates requests.
2. Obtains a new access token when the old one expires.
3. Saves OAuth values in OAuthSettingsLocation to be persisted across connections.

Connecting to Microsoft Planner Data Using Data Explorer

You can create a simple application for displaying Microsoft Planner data by utilizing the CData FireDAC Components for Microsoft Planner and a new VCL Forms Application:

1. Open the Data Explorer in RAD Studio and expand FireDAC.
2. Right-click the ODBC Data Source node in the Data Explorer.
3. Click Add New Connection.
4. Enter a name for the connection.
5. In the FireDAC Connection Editor that appears, set the DataSource property to the name of the ODBC DSN for Microsoft Planner.
6. Back in the Data Explorer, expand the tables for the connection.

7. Create a new VCL Forms application and drag a table (for example: Tasks) onto the form.

8. Select the TasksTable object on the form and set the Active property to true.

9. Right-click on the object, bind visually, and link everything (*) to a new control (TStringGrid).

10. Arrange the TStringGrid on the form and run the application to see the Tasks data.