Visualize Neo4J Data in TIBCO Spotfire through ADO.NET

This article walks you through using the CData ADO.NET Provider for Neo4J in TIBCO Spotfire. You will establish a connection and create a simple dashboard.

1. Add the CData ADO.NET data source by clicking Add Data Tables.
2. Click Add -> Database.
3. Select the provider and click Configure.
4. Define the connection settings. Below is a typical connection string:

   Server=localhost;Port=7474;User=my_user;Password=my_password;

   To connect to Neo4j, set the following connection properties:

   • Server: The server hosting the Neo4j instance.
   • Port: The port on which the Neo4j service is running. The provider connects to port 7474 by default.
   • User: The username of the user using the Neo4j instance.
   • Password: The password of the user using the Neo4j instance.

   When you configure the connection, 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.

5. Select the tables that you want to add to the dashboard. This example uses ProductCategory. You can also specify an SQL query. The driver supports the standard SQL syntax.
6. If you want to work with the live data, click the Keep Data Table External option. This option enables your dashboards to reflect changes to the data in real time.

   If you want to load the data into memory and process the data locally, click the Import Data Table option. This option is better for offline use or if a slow network connection is making your dashboard less interactive.

7. After adding tables, the Recommended Visualizations wizard is displayed. When you select a table, Spotfire uses the column data types to detect number, time, and category columns. This example uses CategoryName in the Numbers section and CategoryId in the Categories section.

After adding several visualizations in the Recommended Visualizations wizard, you can make other modifications to the dashboard. For example, you can apply a filter: After clicking the Filter button, the available filters for each query are displayed in the Filters pane.