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The Salesforce ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live Salesforce account data, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.

Access Salesforce data like you would a database - read, write, and update Leads, Contacts, Opportunities, Accounts, etc. through a standard ODBC Driver interface.

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Viewing Salesforce Data in RAD Studio Data Explorer


How to view Salesforce data in RAD Studio Data Explorer using the CData ODBC Driver for Salesforce.

Embarcadero RAD Studio provides a development environment for Delphi and C++Builder applications. With the CData ODBC Driver for Salesforce, you gain access to live Salesforce data within RAD Studio, abstracting the data into tables, views, and stored procedures that can be used to both retrieve and update Salesforce data. This article will walk through connecting to Salesforce using the Data Explorer.

Configure a Connection to Salesforce

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

There are several authentication methods available for connecting to Salesforce: Login, OAuth, and SSO. The Login method requires you to have the username, password, and security token of the user.

If you do not have access to the username and password or do not wish to require them, you can use OAuth authentication.

SSO (single sign-on) can be used by setting the SSOProperties, SSOLoginUrl, and TokenUrl connection properties, which allow you to authenticate to an identity provider. See the "Getting Started" chapter in the help documentation for more information.

Connecting to Salesforce Data Using Data Explorer

You can create a simple application for displaying Salesforce data by utilizing the CData FireDAC Components for Salesforce and a new VCL Forms Application:

  1. Open the Data Explorer in RAD Studio and expand FireDAC.
  2. Right-click the ODBC Data Source node in the Data Explorer.
  3. Click Add New Connection.
  4. Enter a name for the connection.
  5. In the FireDAC Connection Editor that appears, set the DataSource property to the name of the ODBC DSN for Salesforce.
  6. Back in the Data Explorer, expand the tables for the connection.

  7. Create a new VCL Forms application and drag a table (for example: Account) onto the form.

  8. Select the AccountTable object on the form and set the Active property to true.

  9. Right-click on the object, bind visually, and link everything (*) to a new control (TStringGrid).

  10. Arrange the TStringGrid on the form and run the application to see the Account data.