Model, Search, and Visualize Live QuickBooks Data in ThoughtSpot

Jerod Johnson
Jerod Johnson
Director, Technology Evangelism
Use CData Connect AI to connect to live QuickBooks data for modeling, searching, and visualizing.

ThoughtSpot is a cloud-based analytics platform that uses artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing (NLP) to help users analyze data and make decisions. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to QuickBooks data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to connect to QuickBooks and build visualizations from QuickBooks data in ThoughtSpot.

About QuickBooks Data Integration

CData simplifies access and integration of live QuickBooks data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:

  • Access both local and remote company files.
  • Connect across editions and regions: QuickBooks Premier, Professional, Enterprise, and Simple Start edition 2002+, as well as Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and UK editions from 2003+.
  • Use SQL stored procedures to perform actions like voiding or clearing transactions, merging lists, searching entities, and more.

Customers regularly integrate their QuickBooks data with preferred tools, like Power BI, Tableau, or Excel, and integrate QuickBooks data into their database or data warehouse.


Getting Started


CData Connect AI provides a pure SQL Server, cloud-to-cloud interface for QuickBooks, allowing you to easily build models and visualizations from live QuickBooks data in ThoughtSpot. As you build visualizations, ThoughtSpot generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to QuickBooks, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return QuickBooks data.

Configure QuickBooks Connectivity for ThoughtSpot

Connectivity to QuickBooks from ThoughtSpot is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with QuickBooks data from ThoughtSpot, we start by creating and configuring a QuickBooks connection.

  1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection
    2. Adding a Connection
  2. Select "QuickBooks" from the Add Connection panel
    3. Selecting a data source
  3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to QuickBooks.

    QuickBooks runs on-premises, so Connect AI requires the Connect Gateway to reach it. Install and start the gateway on the same machine (or network) as QuickBooks, then set the URL connection property to the Remote Connector address (e.g., http://remotehost:8166) and enter your User and Password.

    Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)
  4. Click Save & Test
  5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add QuickBooks Connection page and update the User-based permissions. Updating permissions

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect AI through the REST API, the OData API, or the Virtual SQL Server, a Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect AI. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each service to maintain granularity of access.

  1. Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open the settings page.
  2. On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
  3. Give the PAT a name and click Create. Creating a new PAT
  4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured and a PAT generated, you are ready to connect to QuickBooks data from ThoughtSpot.

Model, Search, and Visualize Live QuickBooks Data in ThoughtSpot

To establish a connection from ThoughtSpot to the CData Connect AI Virtual SQL Server API, follow these steps.

  1. Log into ThoughtSpot
  2. On the top navigation bar, click Data.
  3. Click Create new > Connection. Creating a new connection.
  4. Name the connection and click "SQL Server" as the data warehouse. Selecting SQL Server as the connection type.
  5. Click Continue on the top right.
  6. Enter the connection settings:
    • Host: enter the Virtual SQL Server endpoint: tds.cdata.com
    • Port: : enter 14333
    • Username: enter your CData Connect AI username. This is displayed in the top-right corner of the CData Connect AI interface. For example, [email protected].
    • Password: enter the PAT you generated on the Settings page.
    • Database: enter the Connection Name of the CData Connect AI data source you want to connect to (for example, QuickBooks1).
    Configuring the connection to the Virtual SQL Server API
  7. Click Continue.
  8. After connecting successfully, you will be able to choose which tables to include. Selecting tables (Salesforce is shown).
  9. Click Create Connection.

After you successfully configure your connection, you can build models, search, and visualize your QuickBooks data.

Real-Time Access to QuickBooks Data from Cloud Applications

At this point, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live QuickBooks data from ThoughtSpot. You can model, search, and visualize your data from ThoughtSpot . For more information on gaining live access to data from more than 100 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources from cloud applications like ThoughtSpot, refer to our Connect AI page.

Ready to get started?

Learn more about CData Connect AI or sign up for free trial access:

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