Connect to SAP BusinessObjects BI Data in as an External Source in Dremio

The CData JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI implements JDBC Standards and allows various applications, including Dremio, to work with live SAP BusinessObjects BI data. Dremio is a data lakehouse platform designed to empower self-service, interactive analytics on the data lake. With the CData JDBC Driver, you can include live SAP BusinessObjects BI data as a part of your enterprise data lake. This article describes how to connect to SAP BusinessObjects BI data from Dremio as an External Source.

The CData JDBC Driver enables high-speed access to live SAP BusinessObjects BI data in Dremio. Once you install the driver, authenticate with SAP BusinessObjects BI and gain immediate access to SAP BusinessObjects BI data within your data lake. By surfacing SAP BusinessObjects BI data using native data types and handling complex filters, aggregations, & other operations automatically, the CData JDBC Driver grants seamless access to SAP BusinessObjects BI data.

Build the ARP Connector

To use the CData JDBC Driver in Dremio, you need to build an Advanced Relation Pushdown (ARP) Connector. You can view the source code for the Connector on GitHub or download the ZIP file (GitHub.com) directly. Once you copy or extract the files, run the following command from the root directory of the connector (the directory containing the pom.xml file) to build the connector.

mvn clean install

Once the JAR file for the connector is built (in the target directory), you are ready to copy the ARP connector and JDBC Driver to your Dremio instance.

Installing the Connector and JDBC Driver

Install the ARP Connector to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/ and the JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI to %DREMIO_HOME%/jars/3rdparty. You can use commands similar to the following:

ARP Connector

docker cp PATH\TO\dremio-sapbusinessobjectsbi-plugin-20.0.0.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/

JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI

docker cp PATH\TO\cdata.jdbc.sapbusinessobjectsbi.jar dremio_image_name:/opt/dremio/jars/3rdparty/

Connecting to SAP BusinessObjects BI

SAP BusinessObjects BI will now appear as an External Source option in Dremio. The ARP Connector built uses a JDBC URL to connect to SAP BusinessObjects BI data. The JDBC Driver has a built-in connection string designer that you can use (see below).

Built-in Connection String Designer

For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the SAP BusinessObjects BI JDBC Driver. Double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command line.

java -jar cdata.jdbc.sapbusinessobjectsbi.jar

Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

To connect to your SAP Business Objects BI instance, you must set the following connection properties:

• Url: set this to the rest API URL. After logging into the Central Management Console, choose 'Applications' from the combo box. Double-click on 'RESTful Web Service' and you'll see the access URL. By default it is, http://{Server-Name}:6405/biprws.
• User: set this to the username of your instance.
• Password: set this to the password of your instance.

NOTE: To use the JDBC Driver in Dremio, you will need a license (full or trial) and a Runtime Key (RTK). For more information on obtaining this license (or a trial), contact our sales team.

Add the Runtime Key (RTK) to the JDBC URL. You will end up with a JDBC URL similar to the following:

jdbc:sapbusinessobjectsbi:RTK=5246...;User=username;Password=password;Url=http://myinstance:6405/biprws

Access SAP BusinessObjects BI as an External Source

To add SAP BusinessObjects BI as an External Source, click to add a new source and select SAPBusinessObjectsBI. Copy the JDBC URL and paste it into the New SAPBusinessObjectsBI Source wizard.

Save the connection and you are ready to query live SAP BusinessObjects BI data in Dremio, easily incorporating SAP BusinessObjects BI data into your data lake.

More Information & Free Trial

Using the CData JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI in Dremio, you can incorporate live SAP BusinessObjects BI data into your data lake. Check out our CData JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI page for more information about connecting to SAP BusinessObjects BI. Download a free, 30 day trial of the CData JDBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI and get started today.