Build Sage 300-Connected Dashboards Using Zoho Analytics

Zoho Analytics is a modern BI and Analytics platform that allows you to connect and analyze your data, while also creating visualizations and dashboards to discover hidden insights. When paired with CData Connect AI, Zoho Analytics provides instant, cloud-to-cloud access to Sage 300 data for reporting and analytics. This article demonstrates how to connect to Sage 300 using Connect AI and analyze Sage 300 data by creating dashboards in Zoho Analytics.

CData Connect AI provides a pure cloud-to-cloud interface for Sage 300, allowing you to analyze Sage 300 data in Zoho Analytics — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to Sage 300, leveraging server-side processing to return the requested Sage 300 data quickly.

Configure Sage 300 Connectivity for Zoho Analytics

Connectivity to Sage 300 from Zoho Analytics is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with Sage 300 data from Zoho Analytics, we start by creating and configuring a Sage 300 connection.

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection

2. Select "Sage 300" from the Add Connection panel

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Sage 300.

   Sage 300 requires some initial setup in order to communicate over the Sage 300 Web API.

   • Set up the security groups for the Sage 300 user. Give the Sage 300 user access to the option under Security Groups (per each module required).
   • Edit both web.config files in the /Online/Web and /Online/WebApi folders; change the key AllowWebApiAccessForAdmin to true. Restart the webAPI app-pool for the settings to take.
   • Once the user access is configured, click https://server/Sage300WebApi/ to ensure access to the web API.

   Authenticate to Sage 300 using Basic authentication.

   Connect Using Basic Authentication

   You must provide values for the following properties to successfully authenticate to Sage 300. Note that the provider reuses the session opened by Sage 300 using cookies. This means that your credentials are used only on the first request to open the session. After that, cookies returned from Sage 300 are used for authentication.

   • Url: Set this to the url of the server hosting Sage 300. Construct a URL for the Sage 300 Web API as follows: {protocol}://{host-application-path}/v{version}/{tenant}/ For example, http://localhost/Sage300WebApi/v1.0/-/.
   • User: Set this to the username of your account.
   • Password: Set this to the password of your account.
   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Sage 300 Connection page and update the User-based 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.
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 Sage 300 data from Zoho Analytics.

Connect to Sage 300 in Zoho Analytics Using CData Connect AI

To establish a connection from Zoho Analytics to CData Connect AI, follow these steps:

1. Log in to Zoho Analytics.

2. Create a new connection and select Cloud Databases to open the connection modal.

3. Enter the following information:
   • Database Type - select MS SQL Server.
   • Endpoint - enter tds.cdata.com
   • SQL Server Instance Name - leave this blank.
   • 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.
   • Database Name - enter the Connection Name of the CData Connect AI data source you want to connect to (for example, Sage3001).
   • Click Next.
   
4. Choose the table that you would like to import from, e.g. OEInvoices.

5. A Data Preview of the table should pop up. Next, enter a Workspace Name and Table Name to be able to refer to in Zoho Analytics. Click Next.

6. There is an option to schedule the import periodically. After configuring, click Create.

7. Now, the import has been initiated. Click OK.

8. View your new connection in the Zoho Analytics Explorer.

9. Click on the new connection to see the table.

10. Zoho Analytics can auto-generate dashboards for the user, as seen here:

We have successfully imported Sage 300 data into Zoho Analytics and created dashboards.

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