Create Pinterest Dashboards in Bold BI

Bold BI allows you to create, share, and collaborate on interactive BI dashboards. When paired with CData Connect Server, you get instant access to Pinterest data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to create a virtual database for Pinterest and build reports from Pinterest data in Bold BI.

CData Connect Server provides a pure SQL Server interface for Pinterest, allowing you to easily build reports from live Pinterest data in Bold BI — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. As you build visualizations, Bold BI generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Server pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to Pinterest, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return the requested Pinterest data.

Create a Virtual SQL Server Database for Pinterest Data

CData Connect Server uses a straightforward, point-and-click interface to connect to data sources and generate APIs.

1. Login to Connect Server and click Connections.
2. Select "Pinterest" from Available Data Sources.
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Pinterest.

   Pinterest authentication is based on the standard OAuth flow. To authenticate, you must initially create an app via the Pinterest developer platform where you can obtain an OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL.

   Set InitiateOAuth to GETANDREFRESH and set OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL based on the property values for the app you created.

   See the Help documentation for other OAuth authentication flows.

4. Click Save Changes
5. Click Privileges -> Add and add the new user (or an existing user) with the appropriate permissions.

With the virtual database created, you are ready to connect to Pinterest data from Bold BI.

Visualize Live Pinterest Data in Bold BI

The steps below outline connecting to CData Connect Server from Bold BI to create a new Pinterest data source and build a simple visualization from the data.

1. Log into your Bold BI instance, click the data sources tab, create a new data source, and choose the SQL Server connector.
2. Choose the basic configuration and set the connection properties:
   • Name: Name your connection
   • Server name: Your Connect Server instance (CONNECT_SERVER_URL)
   • Port: 1433
   • Username: Your Connect Server username
   • Password: Your Connect Server password
   • Mode: Choose Live to query Pinterest on-demand or choose Extract to load the data into Bold BI
   • Database: Choose the database you created from the drop-down menu (pinterestdb)
3. Click Connect
4. Select the table to visualize and drag it onto the workspace.
5. Select a visualization style and add it to the report.
6. Click the gear icon for the visualization to configure the visualization properties and assign columns to the visualization.

SQL Access to Pinterest Data from Applications

Now you have a direct connection to live Pinterest data from your Bold BI workbook. You can create more data sources and new visualizations, build reports, and more — all without replicating Pinterest data.

To get SQL data access to 200+ SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your applications, see the CData Connect page.