Integrate Dify with Live Presto Data via CData Connect AI
Dify is an open source platform for building production-ready agentic workflows, chatbots, and other LLM applications. It includes built-in, two-way support for the model context protocol (MCP), allowing you to register remote MCP servers as tools in the platform to add external data sources and give your agents access to live data.
By integrating Dify with CData Connect AI through the built-in MCP Server, Dify gains governed, real-time access to live Presto data. You can list catalogs, explore schemas, and query records from Presto data using natural language prompts, with all data access running securely against authorized sources.
This article explains how to configure Presto connectivity in Connect AI, generate the required personal access token, register the Connect AI MCP Server as a tool in Dify, add it to an agent application, and verify the integration by querying live Presto data from Dify.
About Presto Data Integration
Accessing and integrating live data from Trino and Presto SQL engines has never been easier with CData. Customers rely on CData connectivity to:
- Access data from Trino v345 and above (formerly PrestoSQL) and Presto v0.242 and above (formerly PrestoDB)
- Read and write access all of the data underlying your Trino or Presto instances
- Optimized query generation for maximum throughput.
Presto and Trino allow users to access a variety of underlying data sources through a single endpoint. When paired with CData connectivity, users get pure, SQL-92 access to their instances, allowing them to integrate business data with a data warehouse or easily access live data directly from their preferred tools, like Power BI and Tableau.
In many cases, CData's live connectivity surpasses the native import functionality available in tools. One customer was unable to effectively use Power BI due to the size of the datasets needed for reporting. When the company implemented the CData Power BI Connector for Presto they were able to generate reports in real-time using the DirectQuery connection mode.
Getting Started
Step 1: Configure Presto connectivity for Dify
Connectivity to Presto from Dify is made possible through Connect AI's Remote MCP Server. To interact with Presto data from Dify, start by creating and configuring a Presto connection in Connect AI.
- Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection
- Select Presto from the Add Connection panel
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Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Presto.
Set the Server and Port connection properties to connect, in addition to any authentication properties that may be required.
To enable TLS/SSL, set UseSSL to true.
Authenticating with LDAP
In order to authenticate with LDAP, set the following connection properties:
- AuthScheme: Set this to LDAP.
- User: The username being authenticated with in LDAP.
- Password: The password associated with the User you are authenticating against LDAP with.
Authenticating with Kerberos
In order to authenticate with KERBEROS, set the following connection properties:
- AuthScheme: Set this to KERBEROS.
- KerberosKDC: The Kerberos Key Distribution Center (KDC) service used to authenticate the user.
- KerberosRealm: The Kerberos Realm used to authenticate the user with.
- KerberosSPN: The Service Principal Name for the Kerberos Domain Controller.
- KerberosKeytabFile: The Keytab file containing your pairs of Kerberos principals and encrypted keys.
- User: The user who is authenticating to Kerberos.
- Password: The password used to authenticate to Kerberos.
- Click Save & Test
- Navigate to the Permissions tab and update user-based permissions
Add a Personal Access Token
A Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect AI from Dify. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each integration to maintain granular access control.
- Click the gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open Settings
- On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT
- Give the PAT a descriptive name and click Create
- Copy the token when displayed and store it securely. It will not be shown again
With the Presto connection configured and a PAT generated, Dify can now connect to Presto data through Connect AI.
Step 2: Register the Connect AI MCP Server in Dify
Next, register the Connect AI Remote MCP Server as a tool in Dify so your agents and workflows can discover and call live data tools through Connect AI.
- Log into Dify, or open your self-hosted Dify instance (version 1.6.0 or later, which includes built-in MCP support)
- Navigate to the Integrations page, select Tools and click MCP tab
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Click Add MCP Server (HTTP) and enter the following details:
- Server URL: https://mcp.cloud.cdata.com/mcp
- Name Icon: Give a descriptive name, for example, CData Connect AI
- Server Identifier: A unique identifier, for example, cdata-connect-ai
- Headers: Add an Authorization header with the value Basic your_base64_encoded_email_PAT
Note: Dify will use Basic authentication with Connect AI. Combine your Connect AI user email and the PAT you created earlier in the format email:PAT, base64 encode the combined string, and prefix it with Basic.
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Click Add & Authorize. Dify connects to the Connect AI MCP Server and lists the available tools
With the MCP server registered, the Connect AI tools are available to any agent application or workflow in your Dify workspace.
Step 3: Query live Presto data from Dify
With the integration complete, build an agent application in Dify and interact with live Presto data through natural language prompts.
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From the Dify Studio page, click Create from Blank and select Agent as the application type
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In the agent configuration, click Add under the Tools section and select the Connect AI MCP tools registered in Step 2
- Select an LLM provider and model for the agent so it can interpret prompts and call MCP tools
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In the preview panel, type a prompt in the chat input, for example:
- Use the cdata-connect-ai tools to list all available catalogs
- Show the available schemas and tables for Presto
- Query the top 5 records from a table in Presto
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The Dify agent calls the Connect AI MCP Server and returns live results from Presto data
At this point, Dify communicates with the Connect AI MCP Server and retrieves live Presto data through remote MCP tools directly from your agentic workflows.
Get started with CData Connect AI
To access hundreds of SaaS, big data, and NoSQL sources directly from your cloud applications, try CData Connect AI today. Download a free 14-day trial of CData Connect AI, and our Support Team is available to help with any questions you have.