Automate PingOne Tasks in Power Automate Using CData API Server

Microsoft Power Automate is a cloud-based, low-code/no-code platform that makes it easy to automate repetitive tasks and streamline business processes across various applications and services.

CData API Server extends the capabilities of Power Automate by enabling access to data from multiple sources and applications—whether on-premises or in the cloud. With the PingOne Connector in the API Server (or any of the 200 available connectors), you can natively create actions and complex workflows and trigger them in Power Automate using industry-standard data access protocols like OData and Swagger.

In this article, we'll set up Power Automate and CData API Server to create a simple trigger that sends an email or notification whenever a lead in a PingOne table matches specific criteria.

Let's begin!

Prerequisites

1. CData API Server: Download a free trial here.
2. Microsoft Power Automate: Signup for a free trial from here.
3. An active PingOne account with access to your data.

Overview

Here's a quick overview of the steps we'll follow:

1. Install CData API Server, configure a connection to PingOne, and generate OData API endpoints for PingOne data within the API Server.
2. Use these endpoints in Power Automate to build a flow that automatically sends an email based on triggers from your PingOne table when specific criteria are met.

Step 1: Install the API Server and Add a Connection to PingOne

1.1 Install the API Server

If you haven't already, download an installer for your operating system from the CData API Server page. Follow the installation wizard to complete the setup on your machine.

Once installed, you can start the server in the following ways:

• Windows: CData API Server runs as a service by default. Ensure the service is running, then open http://localhost:8080/ in your browser to access the API Server admin console.
• Linux/Mac: You can run the server manually or as a service. To start it manually, navigate to the installation directory and run java -jar apiserver.jar.
• Alternatively, run service.sh with root privileges to set up API Server as a Linux system service.

1.2 Enable CORS

When Microsoft Power Automate and the CData API Server are hosted on different domains, CORS (Cross-Origin Resource Sharing) must be enabled to allow seamless cross-domain communication. To enable CORS in the API Server:

1. Go to Settings and click the icon to edit CORS settings.
2. Enable Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS).
3. Enable Allow all domains without '*' to accept any origin.
4. In Access-Control-Allow-Origin, enter your PingOne origin domain, or use * to allow all domains (suitable for public APIs).
5. Enable Access-Control-Allow-Credentials to allow cookies and auth headers.
6. In Access-Control-Allow-Methods, enter GET, PUT, POST, OPTIONS.
7. In Access-Control-Allow-Headers, enter Authorization, Content-Type.
8. Set Access-Control-Max-Age (default: 3600 seconds) to cache preflight requests.
9. Click Save.

1.3 Add a PingOne Connection in the API Server

1. Go to Settings and click Add Connection in the top-right.
2. Select PingOne. If it's not visible, toggle off Only Installed to view all connectors.
3. Click Install Connector to auto-install. For a manual setup, choose Manual Install and upload the downloaded ZIP file.
4. Once installed, click PingOne again to open its connection settings and configure using the details below.

To connect to PingOne, configure these properties:

• Region: The region where the data for your PingOne organization is being hosted.
• AuthScheme: The type of authentication to use when connecting to PingOne.
• Either WorkerAppEnvironmentId (required when using the default PingOne domain) or AuthorizationServerURL, configured as described below.

Configuring WorkerAppEnvironmentId

WorkerAppEnvironmentId is the ID of the PingOne environment in which your Worker application resides. This parameter is used only when the environment is using the default PingOne domain (auth.pingone). It is configured after you have created the custom OAuth application you will use to authenticate to PingOne, as described in Creating a Custom OAuth Application in the Help documentation.

First, find the value for this property:

1. From the home page of your PingOne organization, move to the navigation sidebar and click Environments.
2. Find the environment in which you have created your custom OAuth/Worker application (usually Administrators), and click Manage Environment. The environment's home page displays.
3. In the environment's home page navigation sidebar, click Applications.
4. Find your OAuth or Worker application details in the list.
5. Copy the value in the Environment ID field. It should look similar to:
   WorkerAppEnvironmentId='11e96fc7-aa4d-4a60-8196-9acf91424eca'

Now set WorkerAppEnvironmentId to the value of the Environment ID field.

Configuring AuthorizationServerURL

AuthorizationServerURL is the base URL of the PingOne authorization server for the environment where your application is located. This property is only used when you have set up a custom domain for the environment, as described in the PingOne platform API documentation. See Custom Domains.

Authenticating to PingOne with OAuth

PingOne supports both OAuth and OAuthClient authentication. In addition to performing the configuration steps described above, there are two more steps to complete to support OAuth or OAuthCliet authentication:

• Create and configure a custom OAuth application, as described in Creating a Custom OAuth Application in the Help documentation.
• To ensure that the driver can access the entities in Data Model, confirm that you have configured the correct roles for the admin user/worker application you will be using, as described in Administrator Roles in the Help documentation.
• Set the appropriate properties for the authscheme and authflow of your choice, as described in the following subsections.

OAuth (Authorization Code grant)

Set AuthScheme to OAuth.

Desktop Applications

Get and Refresh the OAuth Access Token

After setting the following, you are ready to connect:

• InitiateOAuth: GETANDREFRESH. To avoid the need to repeat the OAuth exchange and manually setting the OAuthAccessToken each time you connect, use InitiateOAuth.
• OAuthClientId: The Client ID you obtained when you created your custom OAuth application.
• OAuthClientSecret: The Client Secret you obtained when you created your custom OAuth application.
• CallbackURL: The redirect URI you defined when you registered your custom OAuth application. For example: https://localhost:3333

When you connect, the driver opens PingOne's OAuth endpoint in your default browser. Log in and grant permissions to the application. The driver then completes the OAuth process:

1. The driver obtains an access token from PingOne and uses it to request data.
2. The OAuth values are saved in the location specified in OAuthSettingsLocation, to be persisted across connections.

The driver refreshes the access token automatically when it expires.

For other OAuth methods, including Web Applications, Headless Machines, or Client Credentials Grant, refer to the Help documentation.

5. Click Save & Test to validate and complete the connection setup.

1.4 Add and Configure Users

To allow secure access to the created OData endpoints, create and configure Users in the CData API Server. Each user has authentication credentials and role-based access control, ensuring that only authorized users with appropriate roles can query the connected data.

1. Go to Users from the navigation pane, then click Add User in the top-right corner.
2. Enter a Username and set a secure Password for the user.
3. Select a Role:
   • Admin: Full access to all features, including settings and connections.
   • Query: Limited to data access via API endpoints (suitable for Power Automate use).
4. (Optional) Configure rate limits:
   • Requests Per Hour: Number of allowed API calls per hour (default: 1000).
   • Max Concurrent Requests: Number of parallel API requests allowed (default: 10).
5. Define Privileges for the user:
   • GET: Allows data retrieval.
   • POST: Allows creation of new records.
   • PUT, MERGE, PATCH: Allows updates to existing records.
   • DELETE: Allows deletion of records.
6. Click Add User to save and activate the user account.

Once a user is added, an Authtoken is automatically generated. This token can be used in API requests as a secure authentication method instead of a password.

You can also refresh the Authtoken, disable it, or set expiration rules (e.g., number of days until expiry) by enabling the Token Expiration option in the user settings.

1.5 Add Tables for the Endpoint

To make data from PingOne available in Power Automate via OData, you need to expose your desired tables through the API Server. Here's how:

1. In the CData API Server, go to API from the left navigation, then click Add Table at the top-right.
2. Select the PingOne connection you configured earlier, then click Next.
3. Browse available entities and schema by expanding the Tables section. Select individual tables, or click the TABLE NAME checkbox at the top to select all. Then click Confirm.

1.6 Access the Endpoints in Power Automate

Now that your API is configured, Power Automate can connect to the OData endpoints to automate tasks. Below are the URL formats for OData endpoints that you can use:

These OData endpoints are now ready to be directly consumed in Power Automate using the URL. Since Power Automate supports OData, you can easily automate workflows, trigger actions, and integrate live data from PingOne into your automated processes.

The CData API Server supports full OData filtering capabilities. For custom queries and filtered visualizations, you can append standard OData query parameters like $select, $filter, $orderby, $top, and $skip to your requests.

Step 2: Automate an Email Triggers in Power Automate

You've got the CData API Server up and running now with consumable OData endpoints from your PingOne data. Now let's build a Power Automate flow to automate an email trigger based on a criteria.

In this example, we'll build a flow that reads lead and opportunity data from the Opportunity table in PingOne. The flow will identify the lead with the highest value in the ExpectedRevenue column and automatically send an email containing the details of that lead.

We'll use Power Automate Desktop along with the Outlook app on Windows 11. If you don't have Outlook installed on your Windows machine, you can download it from the Microsoft 365 official site or install it via the Microsoft Store.

2.1 Filter the API OData Endpoint

With full support for OData URL filters (OData ABNF) in CData API Server, you can filter your tables (resources) directly in the URL to limit and sort the results before they are even pulled into your flow. This reduces load time and improves efficiency. Check out the complete list of supported filter options here.

For our example, the filtered URL looks like this: http://localhost:8080/api.rsc/public_Opportunity?$top=1&$orderby=ExpectedRevenue desc

You can build your own endpoint URL like this. Here's what each part means:

2.2 Build the Flow in Power Automate Desktop

1. Launch Power Automate Desktop and click on New on top-left to add a new flow.
2. Give your flow a name (e.g., Email-Trigger) and click Create.
   
3. In the flow designer dashboard, search for Region under the Actions pane and double-click to add it. Give it a descriptive name and click Save.
4. Search for Invoke Web Service, double-click to add it, and configure the following:
   • URL: Enter the filtered OData URL created earlier.
   • Method: GET
   • Accept: application/json
   • Content-Type: application/json
   • Save response: Get text into variable (for web pages)
   • Click Save.
   
5. Search for Convert JSON to Custom Object and double-click to add it.
   • Click the blue {x} icon and select the variable %WebServiceResponse%.
   • Click Save.
   
6. Search for Outlook and select Launch Outlook. Double-click to add it to the flow, then click Save.
7. Search for Outlook and select Send email message through Outlook. Double-click to add it, then configure the following:
   • Outlook instance: %OutlookInstance%
   • Account: Enter your Outlook email address.
   • Send email message from: Account
   • To: Enter the recipient's email address.
   • Subject: Add an email subject line, e.g., New Opportunity with Highest Expected Revenue
   • Body: Paste the following simple HTML code. Replace the label and table names with your own.:
     Top Lead Details:

Account ID: %JsonAsCustomObject['value'][0]['AccountId']%

Name: %JsonAsCustomObject['value'][0]['Name']%

Expected Revenue: %JsonAsCustomObject['value'][0]['ExpectedRevenue']%

Close Date: %JsonAsCustomObject['value'][0]['CloseDate']%
   • Body is HTML: Toggle on this option.
   • Click Save.
   
8. Search for Outlook and select Close Outlook. Double-click to add it to the flow, then click Save.
9. Search for End region and double-click to add it to the flow.
10. Your final flow should look like this:
    
11. Click Run on top to start the flow. The process will automatically open Outlook and send an email to the recipient as specified in the flow. Your email should look like this:
    

2.3 Schedule and Refine the Flow

Your flow now sends an email when a new lead with the highest ExpectedRevenue is found. Since Power Automate Desktop doesn't support built-in scheduling, you'll need to use Windows Task Scheduler or Power Automate (cloud) to run it continuously at set intervals.

To avoid duplicate emails, use the Write text to file action in Power Automate to save the Id field to a file (e.g., lastLead.txt). On each run, use the Read text from file action to compare it with the current Id. If they match, skip the email—ensuring alerts are only sent for new leads.

This flow is just the beginning. You can extend it to update CRM records, log high-value leads to Excel, or send real-time Slack alerts—automating even more steps in your lead management process.

Try CData API Server Free for 30 Days

Build OData REST APIs with low-code/no-code platform and unlock seamless integration with your live data. Try CData API Server free for 30 days and experience how easily you can automate tasks using live data from PingOne (or any of the 200 available connectors) in Power Automate.

Start your free trial here.