Connect to Okta Data as an External Data Source using PolyBase

PolyBase for SQL Server allows you to query external data by using the same Transact-SQL syntax used to query a database table. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for Okta, you get access to your Okta data directly alongside your SQL Server data. This article describes creating an external data source and external tables to grant access to live Okta data using T-SQL queries.

NOTE: PolyBase is only available on SQL Server 19 and above.

CData Connect AI provides a pure SQL Server interface for Okta, allowing you to query data from Okta without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to Okta, leveraging server-side processing to return the requested Okta data quickly.

Configure Okta Connectivity for PolyBase

Connectivity to Okta from PolyBase is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with Okta data from PolyBase, we start by creating and configuring a Okta connection.

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection

2. Select "Okta" from the Add Connection panel

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Okta.

   To connect to Okta, set the Domain connection string property to your Okta domain.

   You will use OAuth to authenticate with Okta, so you need to create a custom OAuth application.

   Creating a Custom OAuth Application

   From your Okta account:

   1. Sign in to your Okta developer edition organization with your administrator account.
   2. In the Admin Console, go to Applications > Applications.
   3. Click Create App Integration.
   4. For the Sign-in method, select OIDC - OpenID Connect.
   5. For Application type, choose Web Application.
   6. Enter a name for your custom application.
   7. Set the Grant Type to Authorization Code. If you want the token to be automatically refreshed, also check Refresh Token.
   8. Set the callback URL:
      • For desktop applications and headless machines, use http://localhost:33333 or another port number of your choice. The URI you set here becomes the CallbackURL property.
      • For web applications, set the callback URL to a trusted redirect URL. This URL is the web location the user returns to with the token that verifies that your application has been granted access.
   9. In the Assignments section, either select Limit access to selected groups and add a group, or skip group assignment for now.
   10. Save the OAuth application.
   11. The application's Client Id and Client Secret are displayed on the application's General tab. Record these for future use. You will use the Client Id to set the OAuthClientId and the Client Secret to set the OAuthClientSecret.
   12. Check the Assignments tab to confirm that all users who must access the application are assigned to the application.
   13. On the Okta API Scopes tab, select the scopes you wish to grant to the OAuth application. These scopes determine the data that the app has permission to read, so a scope for a particular view must be granted for the driver to have permission to query that view. To confirm the scopes required for each view, see the view-specific pages in Data Model < Views in the Help documentation.
   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Okta Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect AI through the REST API, the OData API, or the Virtual SQL Server, a Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect AI. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each service to maintain granularity of access.

1. Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open the settings page.
2. On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
3. Give the PAT a name and click Create.
4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured and a PAT generated, you are ready to connect to Okta data from Polybase.

Create an External Data Source for Okta Data

After configuring the connection, you need to create a credential database for the external data source.

Creating a Credential Database

Execute the following SQL command to create credentials for the external data source connected to Okta data.

NOTE: Set IDENTITY to your Connect AI username and set SECRET to your Personal Access Token.

CREATE DATABASE SCOPED CREDENTIAL ConnectCloudCredentials
WITH IDENTITY = 'yourusername', SECRET = 'yourPAT';

Create an External Data Source for Okta

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE SQL command to create an external data source for Okta with PolyBase:

CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE ConnectCloudInstance
WITH ( 
  LOCATION = 'sqlserver://tds.cdata.com:14333',
  PUSHDOWN = ON,
  CREDENTIAL = ConnectCloudCredentials
);

Create External Tables for Okta

After creating the external data source, use CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE statements to link to Okta data from your SQL Server instance. The table column definitions must match those exposed by CData Connect AI. You can use the Data Explorer in Connect AI to see the table definition.

Sample CREATE TABLE Statement

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE SQL command to create the external table(s), using the collation and setting the LOCATION to three-part notation for the connection, catalog, and table. The statement to create an external table based on a Okta Users would look similar to the following.

CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE Users(
  Id COLLATE [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  ProfileFirstName COLLATE [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  ...
) WITH ( 
  LOCATION='Okta1.Okta.Users',
  DATA_SOURCE=ConnectCloudInstance
);

Having created external tables for Okta in your SQL Server instance, you are now able to query local and remote data simultaneously. To get live data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your SQL Server database, try CData Connect AI today!