Automated Continuous Outlook Data Replication to OneLake in Microsoft Fabric

Always-on applications rely on automatic failover capabilities and real-time data access. CData Sync integrates live Outlook data into your OneLake instance in Microsoft Fabric, allowing you to consolidate all your data into a single location for archiving, reporting, analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence and more.

Configure OneLake as a Replication Destination

Using CData Sync, you can replicate Outlook data to OneLake. To add a replication destination, navigate to the Connections tab.

1. Click Add Connection.
2. Click Destinations tab and locate the Azure OneLake connector.
3. Click the Configure Connection icon at the end of that row to open the New Connection page. If the Configure Connection icon is not available, click the Download Connector icon to install the OneLake connector. For more information about installing new connectors, see Connections in the Help documentation.
4. After the connected is added, enter the following Basic connection properties under Settings to connect to OneLake:
   • Connection Name: Enter a connection name of your choice.
   • File Format: Select the file format that you want to use. Sync supports the CSV, PARQUET, and AVRO file formats.
   • URI: Enter the path of the file system and folder that contains your files (for example, onelake://Workspace/Test.LakeHouse/Files/CustomFolder).
   • Auth Scheme: To connect with a Microsoft Entra ID user account, select Azure AD for Auth Scheme. CData Sync provides an embedded OAuth application with which to connect so no additional properties are required.
   • Data Model: Specify the data format to use while parsing the selected file format documents and generating the database metadata.
   • If you are hosting CData Sync (locally or in your own cloud):
     • Use CData CallbackURL: Disable the toggle.
     • Callback URL: Enter the Callback URL.
   • If you are using CData Sync Cloud, leave the Use CData CallbackURL toggle enabled.
   
5. Navigate to the Advanced tab and scroll down to the Miscellaneous section.
6. In Include Files, enter the file format initially selected.
7. Select Create from Insert Mode dropdown. The other Insert Mode options are Overwrite and Batch.
8. Now, navigate back to Basic settings and click Connect to Azure OneLake.
9. Once connected, click Create & Test to save the connection.

You are now connected to OneLake and can use it as both a source and a destination.

NOTE: You can use the Label feature to add a label for a source or a destination.

In this article, we will demonstrate how to load Outlook data into OneLake and utilize it as a destination.

Configure the Outlook Connection

You can configure a connection to Outlook from the Connections tab. To add a connection to your Outlook account, navigate to the Connections tab.

1. Click Add Connection.
2. Select a source (Outlook).
3. Configure the connection properties.
   
   

   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;
   

   
4. Click Connect to Outlook to ensure that the connection is configured properly.
5. Click Save & Test to save the changes.

Configure Replication Queries

CData Sync enables you to control replication with a point-and-click interface and with SQL queries. For each replication you wish to configure, navigate to the Jobs tab and click Add Job. Select the Source and Destination for your replication.

Edit the Job

1. In the Advanced tab of the Job, click Edit Replicate Options and select the Insert Mode as Single File from the dropdown (If the Insert Mode is selected as "Create" in the OneLake connector.)
2. In "Batch" mode, you need to set the Insert Mode in Jobs to File Per Batch.
3. In "Overwrite" mode, both Single File and File Per Batch work.

Replicate Entire Tables

To replicate an entire table, navigate to the Task tab in the Job, click Add Tasks, choose the table(s) from the list of Outlook tables you wish to replicate into OneLake, and click Add Tasks again.

Customize Your Replication

You can use the Columns and Query tabs of a task to customize your replication. The Columns tab allows you to specify which columns to replicate, rename the columns at the destination, and even perform operations on the source data before replicating. The Query tab allows you to add filters, grouping, and sorting to the replication with the help of SQL queries.

Schedule Your Replication

Select the Overview tab in the Job, and click Configure under Schedule. You can schedule a job to run automatically by configuring it to run at specified intervals, ranging from once every 10 minutes to once every month.

Once you have configured the replication job, click Save Changes. You can configure any number of jobs to manage the replication of your Outlook data to OneLake.

Run the Replication Job

Once all the required configurations are made for the job, select the Outlook table you wish to replicate and click Run. After the replication completes successfully, a notification appears, showing the time taken to run the job and the number of rows replicated.

Free Trial & More Information

Now that you have seen how to replicate Outlook data into OneLake, visit our CData Sync page to explore more about CData Sync and download a free 30-day trial. Start consolidating your enterprise data today!

As always, our world-class Support Team is ready to answer any questions you may have.