Use the CData ODBC Driver for Outlook in MicroStrategy

MicroStrategy is an analytics and mobility platform that enables data-driven innovation. When you pair MicroStrategy with the CData ODBC Driver for Outlook, you gain database-like access to live Outlook data from MicroStrategy, expanding your reporting and analytics capabilities. In this article, we walk through creating a database instance for Outlook in MicroStrategy Developer and creating a Warehouse Catalog based on Outlook data.

The CData ODBC driver offers unmatched performance for interacting with live Outlook data in MicroStrategy due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from MicroStrategy to Outlook, the driver pushes supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Outlook 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 Outlook data using native MicroStrategy data types.

Connect to Outlook as an ODBC Data Source

Information for connecting to Outlook follows, along with different instructions for configuring a DSN in Windows and Linux environments (the ODBC Driver for Outlook must be installed on the machine hosting the connected MicroStrategy Intelligence Server).

Using OAuth Authentication

Microsoft Graph API uses OAuth 2.0 for authentication. You must register an application in the Microsoft Azure Portal to obtain OAuth credentials (Client ID and Client Secret).

Obtaining OAuth Credentials

1. Log in to the Azure Portal.
2. Navigate to Azure Active Directory > App registrations.
3. Click New registration to create a new application.
4. Enter an application name and select the appropriate account types.
5. Set the Redirect URI to your application's callback URL (e.g., http://localhost:33333 for desktop apps).
6. Click Register to create the application.
7. On the application overview page, copy the Application (client) ID - this is your OAuthClientId.
8. Navigate to Certificates & secrets and create a new client secret.
9. Copy the client secret value - this is your OAuthClientSecret.
10. Navigate to API permissions and add the required Microsoft Graph API permissions:
    • Mail.Read - For accessing email messages
    • Contacts.Read - For accessing contacts
    • Calendars.Read - For accessing calendar events
    • Tasks.Read - For accessing To Do tasks
    • offline_access - For obtaining refresh tokens
11. Click Grant admin consent to grant these permissions.

Connecting with OAuth

After setting the following connection properties, you are ready to connect:

• AuthScheme: Set this to OAuth.
• InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH. The CData API Profile for Outlook will automatically walk through the OAuth process in order to obtain the access token.
• OAuthClientId: Set this to the Application (client) ID from Azure Portal.
• OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the client secret value from Azure Portal.
• TenantId: Set this to your Azure AD tenant identifier (GUID or domain name like 'contoso.onmicrosoft.com').
• CallbackURL: Set this to the Redirect URI you specified in your app registration (e.g., http://localhost:33333 for desktop apps).

Example connection string

Profile=C:\profiles\Outlook.apip;AuthScheme=OAuth;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;OAuthClientId=your_client_id;OAuthClientSecret=your_client_secret;TenantId=your_tenant_id;CallbackUrl=http://localhost:33333;

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 Outlook 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

[CData API Sys]
Driver = CData ODBC Driver for Outlook
Description = My Description
Profile = C:\profiles\Outlook.apip
AuthScheme = OAuth
InitiateOAuth = GETANDREFRESH
OAuthClientId = your_client_id
OAuthClientSecret = your_client_secret
TenantId = your_tenant_id
CallbackUrl = http://localhost:33333

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

Create a Outlook Database Instance in MicroStrategy Developer

You can connect to Outlook in MicroStrategy Developer by adding a database instance based on the CData ODBC Driver for Outlook.^*

1. Open MicroStrategy Developer and select a Project Source.
2. Navigate to Administration -> Configuration Managers -> Database Instances and right-click to add a new instance.
3. Name the instance, select Generic DBMS as the database connection type, and create a new database connection.
4. In the database connection wizard, name the connection and create a new Database Login name, using filler values for the user and password.
5. Select the DSN that you configured earlier as the ODBC data source (i.e., CData API Sys).
6. Select the newly created database connection.

7. In the Project Source, right-click the project and open the Project configuration.
8. Navigate to Database Instances and select the newly created database instance.
9. Close MicroStrategy Developer and restart the connected MicroStrategy Intelligence Server to complete the database instance creation.

With the database instance configured, you will now be able to connect to Outlook data from the Warehouse Catalog and Data Import.

Connect to Outlook Data from the Warehouse Catalog

Once you have created a database instance based on the ODBC Driver for Outlook, you can connect to data from the Warehouse Catalog.

1. Select your project and click Schema -> Warehouse Catalog.
2. In the Read Settings for the Catalog, click Settings and set the queries to retrieve the schema:
   • To retrieve the list of tables, use the following query:

     SELECT 
       CatalogName NAME_SPACE,
       TableName TAB_NAME 
     FROM 
       SYS_TABLES
             

   • To retrieve the list of columns for selected tables, use the following query:

     SELECT DISTINCT 
       CatalogName NAME_SPACE, 
       TableName TAB_NAME, 
       ColumnName COL_NAME, 
       DataTypeName DATA_TYPE, 
       Length DATA_LEN, 
       NumericPrecision DATA_PREC, 
       NumericScale DATA_SCALE 
     FROM 
       SYS_TABLECOLUMNS 
     WHERE 
       TableName IN (#TABLE_LIST#) 
     ORDER BY
       1,2,3
             

   
3. Select tables to be used in the project.

If you are interested in connecting to Outlook from other MicroStrategy products, you can read about connecting from MicroStrategy Web and connecting from MicroStrategy Desktop.

Note: connecting using a ODBC driver requires a 3- or 4-tier architecture.