Use ChatGPT to Talk to Your SAP Data via CData Connect AI

Jerod Johnson
Jerod Johnson
Director, Technology Evangelism
Leverage the CData Connect AI Remote MCP Server to enable ChatGPT to securely answer questions and take actions on your SAP data for you.

ChatGPT is an AI chatbot developed by OpenAI, launched in November 2022. Based on large language models (LLMs), it enables users to refine and steer conversations through natural language processing. ChatGPT's developer mode, available to Plus and Pro subscribers, provides full Model Context Protocol (MCP) support for connecting to external data sources and tools.

CData Connect AI offers a dedicated cloud-to-cloud interface for connecting to SAP data. The CData Connect AI Remote MCP Server enables secure communication between ChatGPT and SAP. This allows you to ask questions and take actions on your SAP data using ChatGPT, all without the need for data replication to a natively supported database. With its inherent optimized data processing capabilities, CData Connect AI efficiently channels all supported SQL operations, including filters and JOINs, directly to SAP. This leverages server-side processing to swiftly deliver the requested SAP data.

About SAP Data Integration

CData provides the easiest way to access and integrate live data from SAP. Customers use CData connectivity to:

  • Access every edition of SAP, including SAP R/3, SAP NetWeaver, SAP ERP / ECC 6.0, and SAP S/4 HANA on premises data that is exposed by the RFC.
  • Perform actions like sending IDoc or IDoc XML files to the server and creating schemas for functions or queries through SQL stored procedures.
  • Connect optimally depending on where a customer's SAP instance is hosted.

While most users leverage our tools to replicate SAP data to databases or data warehouses, many also integrate live SAP data with analytics tools such as Tableau, Power BI, and Excel.


Getting Started


Step 1: Configure SAP Connectivity for ChatGPT

Connectivity to SAP from ChatGPT is made possible through CData Connect AI Remote MCP. To interact with SAP data from ChatGPT, we start by creating and configuring a SAP connection in CData Connect AI.

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

    The Java edition supports connecting to an SAP system using the JCo .jar file. See the "Getting Started" chapter in the help documentation for information on using the Jco JAR file.

    The Windows edition supports connecting to SAP systems using either the librfc32.dll, the librfc32u.dll, NetWeaver, or Web Services (SOAP). Set the ConnectionType connection property to CLASSIC (librfc32.dll), CLASSIC_UNICODE (librfc32u.dll), NETWEAVER, or SOAP.

    Note: We do not distribute the librfc32.dll or other SAP assemblies. You must find them from your SAP installation and install them on your machine.

    All versions of Sync support connecting to an SAP system using Web services (SOAP). If you are using the SOAP interface you must enable SOAP access to your SAP system and set the Client, RFCUrl, SystemNumber, User, and Password properties, under the Authentication section. Additionally, set the ConnectionType to SOAP.

    See this guide on obtaining the connection properties needed to connect to any SAP system.

    Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)
  4. Click Save & Test

With the connection configured, we are ready to connect to SAP data from ChatGPT.

Step 2: Connect ChatGPT to CData Connect AI

Follow these steps to add a CData Connect AI connection in ChatGPT:

  1. Sign in to ChatGPT with a Plus or Pro subscription.
  2. Navigate to Apps from the left panel.
  3. Select the CData Connect AI app from the list.
    4. . Search for CData Connect AI
  4. Click Connect to authenticate to your Connect AI account.
    5. Click Connect to authenticate
  5. Click Sign in with CData Connect AI to add Connect AI to your ChatGPT account.
    6. Sign in with CData Connect AI
  6. After successful authorization, you will be redirected back to ChatGPT.
  7. Click Start Chat to start a new conversation in ChatGPT with Connect AI connected at the background.
    8. Start Chat

Step 3: Explore Live SAP Data with ChatGPT

  1. Start a new conversation in ChatGPT.
  2. Connect AI should ideally be automatically enabled in the chat. If not, navigate to -> More -> CData Connect AI, under the chatbox, to enable the connector from the dropdown
    3. Enable CData Connect AI in the chat
  3. You can now start exploring your data with natural language prompts. ChatGPT will use the Connect AI MCP server to query your live SAP data. Example prompts:
    • "Show me all customers from the last 30 days"
    • "What are my top performing products?"
    • "Analyze sales trends for this quarter"
    • "List all active projects and their current status"
    Refer to CData prompt library for more prompt ideas.
    4. Using natural language to explore your SAP data (Salesforce used here).
  4. Permit ChatGPT to access your SAP data. Click Query Data to continue, or Deny to refuse.
    5. Give permissions to ChatGPT.
  5. ChatGPT translates your natural language queries into SQL and execute them against your SAP data through the Connect AI MCP server.
    6. ChatGPT shows the desired results from your SAP data based on the prompts

Get CData Connect AI

To get live data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your cloud applications, try CData Connect AI today!

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

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