Use the CData JDBC Driver for Paylocity in MicroStrategy

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

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

Connect to Paylocity in MicroStrategy Developer

You can connect to Paylocity in MicroStrategy Developer by adding a database instance based on the CData JDBC Driver for Paylocity.^* Before you begin, you will need to install the JDBC Driver for Paylocity on the machine hosting the MicroStrategy Intelligence Server that your instance of MicroStrategy Developer is connected to.

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, setting the user and password for Paylocity.
5. On the Advanced tab for the connection wizard, set the additional connection string parameters as follows.
   • Add the JDBC keyword to the connection string.
   • Set MSTR_JDBC_JAR_FOLDER to the path of the directory containing the JAR file for the JDBC driver. (C:\Program Files\CData JDBC Driver for Paylocity\lib\ on Windows.)
   • Set DRIVER to cdata.jdbc.paylocity.PaylocityDriver, the driver class.
   • Set URL to the JDBC URL for the Paylocity driver, which contains the necessary connection properties.

     Set the following to establish a connection to Paylocity:

     • RSAPublicKey: Set this to the RSA Key associated with your Paylocity, if the RSA Encryption is enabled in the Paylocity account.

       This property is required for executing Insert and Update statements, and it is not required if the feature is disabled.

     • UseSandbox: Set to true if you are using sandbox account.
     • CustomFieldsCategory: Set this to the Customfields category. This is required when IncludeCustomFields is set to true. The default value for this property is PayrollAndHR.
     • Key: The AES symmetric key(base 64 encoded) encrypted with the Paylocity Public Key. It is the key used to encrypt the content.

       Paylocity will decrypt the AES key using RSA decryption.
       It is an optional property if the IV value not provided, The driver will generate a key internally.

     • IV: The AES IV (base 64 encoded) used when encrypting the content. It is an optional property if the Key value not provided, The driver will generate an IV internally.

     Connect Using OAuth Authentication

     You must use OAuth to authenticate with Paylocity. OAuth requires the authenticating user to interact with Paylocity using the browser. For more information, refer to the OAuth section in the Help documentation.

     The Pay Entry API

     The Pay Entry API is completely separate from the rest of the Paylocity API. It uses a separate Client ID and Secret, and must be explicitly requested from Paylocity for access to be granted for an account. The Pay Entry API allows you to automatically submit payroll information for individual employees, and little else. Due to the extremely limited nature of what is offered by the Pay Entry API, we have elected not to give it a separate schema, but it may be enabled via the UsePayEntryAPI connection property.

     Please be aware that when setting UsePayEntryAPI to true, you may only use the CreatePayEntryImportBatch & MergePayEntryImportBatchgtable stored procedures, the InputTimeEntry table, and the OAuth stored procedures. Attempts to use other features of the product will result in an error. You must also store your OAuthAccessToken separately, which often means setting a different OAuthSettingsLocation when using this connection property.

     Built-in Connection String Designer

     For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Paylocity JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

     java -jar cdata.jdbc.paylocity.jar

     Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

     When you configure the JDBC URL, 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.

   Typical additional connection string properties follow:

   JDBC;MSTR_JDBC_JAR_FOLDER=PATH\TO\JAR\;DRIVER=cdata.jdbc.paylocity.PaylocityDriver;URL={jdbc:paylocity:OAuthClientID=YourClientId;OAuthClientSecret=YourClientSecret;RSAPublicKey=YourRSAPubKey;Key=YourKey;IV=YourIV;};
6. Ensure that you have not selected an ODBC data source (this will trigger MicroStrategy to use the additional connection string parameters to build the database instance) and click OK.
7. Click OK to close the database instance wizard.
8. In the Project Source, right-click the project and open the Project configuration.
9. Navigate to Database Instances, select the newly created database instance, and click OK.
10. 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 Paylocity data from the Warehouse Catalog and Data Import.

Connect to Paylocity Data from the Warehouse Catalog

Once you have created a database instance based on the JDBC Driver for Paylocity, 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 * 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.

Using the CData JDBC Driver for Paylocity in MicroStrategy, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on Paylocity data. Read our other articles on connecting to Paylocity in MictroStrategy Web and connecting to Paylocity in MicroStrategy Desktop for more information.

Note: Connecting using a JDBC Driver requires a 3- or 4-Tier Architecture.