DataBind Charts to Redshift Data

Ready to get started?

Download for a free trial:

Download Now

Learn more:

Amazon Redshift ADO.NET Provider

Rapidly create and deploy powerful .NET applications that integrate with Amazon Redshift data.

In this article

Related articles


Use the standard ADO.NET procedures for databinding to provide bidirectional access to Redshift data from controls in the Visual Studio toolbox. This article demonstrates a graphical approach using wizards in Visual Studio, as well as how to databind with only a few lines of code.

DataBinding enables bidirectional access to data from UI controls. You can use the CData ADO.NET Provider for Redshift to easily databind Redshift data to Windows Forms and Web controls in Visual Studio. This article shows how to use wizards to databind Redshift data to a chart that reflects any changes. The code walk-through section shows how to create a chart in 10 lines of code.

DataBind to a Chart

DataBinding consists of three steps: Instantiate the control, configure the data source, and databind.

Configure the Connection and Select Database Objects

Follow the procedure below to use the Data Source Configuration Wizard to create a chart control and the connection to Redshift. In the wizard, you can select the Redshift entities you want to databind.

  1. In a Windows Forms project, drag and drop a Chart control from the toolbox to the form. In the Data section of the Chart properties, select DataSource and then select Add Project Data Source from the menu.
  2. In the Data Source Configuration Wizard that appears, select Database -> Dataset.
  3. In the Choose Your Data Connection step, click New Connection.

  4. In the Add Connection dialog, click Change to select the CData Redshift Data Source.

    Below is a typical connection string:

    User=admin;Password=admin;Database=dev;Server=examplecluster.my.us-west-2.redshift.amazonaws.com;Port=5439;

    To connect to Redshift, set the following:

    • Server: Set this to the host name or IP address of the cluster hosting the Database you want to connect to.
    • Port: Set this to the port of the cluster.
    • Database: Set this to the name of the database. Or, leave this blank to use the default database of the authenticated user.
    • User: Set this to the username you want to use to authenticate to the Server.
    • Password: Set this to the password you want to use to authenticate to the Server.

    You can obtain the Server and Port values in the AWS Management Console:

    1. Open the Amazon Redshift console (http://console.aws.amazon.com/redshift).
    2. On the Clusters page, click the name of the cluster.
    3. On the Configuration tab for the cluster, copy the cluster URL from the connection strings displayed.

    When you configure the connection, 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.

  5. Choose the database objects you want to work with. This example uses the Orders table.

DataBind

After adding the data source and selecting database objects, you can bind the objects to the chart. This example assigns the x-axis to ShipName and the y-axis to ShipCity.

  1. In the Chart properties, click the button in the Series property to open the Series Collection Editor.
  2. In the Series properties, select the columns you want for the x- and y-axes: Select columns from the menu in the XValueMember and YValueMember properties.

The chart is now databound to the Redshift data. Run the chart to display the current data.

Code Walk-through

DataBinding to Redshift data requires only a few lines of code and can be completed in three easy steps.

  1. Connect to Redshift.
  2. Create the RedshiftDataAdapter to execute the query and create a DataSet to be filled with its results.
  3. DataBind the result set to the chart.

Below is the complete code:

RedshiftConnection conn = new RedshiftConnection("User=admin;Password=admin;Database=dev;Server=examplecluster.my.us-west-2.redshift.amazonaws.com;Port=5439;"); RedshiftCommand comm = new RedshiftCommand("SELECT ShipName, ShipCity FROM Orders", conn); RedshiftDataAdapter da = new RedshiftDataAdapter(comm); DataSet dataset = new DataSet(); da.Fill(dataset); chart1.DataSource = dataset; chart1.Series[0].XValueMember = "ShipName"; chart1.Series[0].YValueMembers = "ShipCity"; // Insert code for additional chart formatting here. chart1.DataBind();