Using the CData ODBC Driver for Stack Exchange in PyCharm
The CData ODBC Drivers can be used in any environment that supports loading an ODBC Driver. In this tutorial we will explore using the CData ODBC Driver for Stack Exchange from within PyCharm. Included are steps for adding the CData ODBC Driver as a data source, as well as basic PyCharm code to query the data source and display results.
To begin, this tutorial will assume that you have already installed the CData ODBC Driver for Stack Exchange as well as PyCharm.
Add Pyodbc to the Project
Follow the steps below to add the pyodbc module to your project.
- Click File -> Settings to open the project settings window.
- Click Project Interpreter from the Project: YourProjectName menu.
- To add pyodbc, click the + button and enter pyodbc.
- Click Install Package to install pyodbc.
Connect to Stack Exchange
You can now connect with an ODBC connection string or a DSN. See the Getting Started section in the CData driver documentation for a guide to creating a DSN on your OS.
Start by setting the Profile connection property to the location of the Stack Exchange Profile on disk (e.g. C:\profiles\StackExchange.apip). Next, set the ProfileSettings connection property to the connection string for Stack Exchange (see below).
Stack Exchange API Profile Settings
Register an application on StackApps to obtain an API Key. The Site property specifies which Stack Exchange site to query (e.g., stackoverflow).
Below is the syntax for a DSN:
[CData API Source] Driver = CData ODBC Driver for Stack Exchange Description = My Description Profile = C:\profiles\StackExchange.apip ProfileSettings = 'APIKey = your_api_key Site = stackoverflow'
Execute SQL to Stack Exchange
Instantiate a Cursor and use the execute method of the Cursor class to execute any SQL statement.
import pyodbc
cnxn = pyodbc.connect('DRIVER={CData ODBC Driver for API};Profile = C:\profiles\StackExchange.apip;ProfileSettings = 'APIKey = your_api_key;Site = stackoverflow';')
cursor = cnxn.cursor()
cursor.execute("SELECT AnswerId, CreationDate FROM Answers WHERE IsAccepted = 'true'")
rows = cursor.fetchall()
for row in rows:
print(row.AnswerId, row.CreationDate)
After connecting to Stack Exchange in PyCharm using the CData ODBC Driver, you will be able to build Python apps with access to Stack Exchange data as if it were a standard database. If you have any questions, comments, or feedback regarding this tutorial, please contact us at [email protected].