How to publish and share Vercel Data dashboards with Tableau Server

Integrate connectivity to Vercel data into your enterprise reporting capabilities. The CData ODBC Driver for Vercel enables you to access live Vercel data in business intelligence tools like Tableau Server. Connectivity to Vercel APIs enables you to monitor changes to your data in real time. Other members of your organization can access your dashboards from a Web browser and get updates from their mobile phone.

This article explains how to configure a DSN on the client and server machines, publish a data source for Vercel to Tableau Server, and publish an entire Workbook to Tableau Server (including the data source). If you publish a data source, you will be able to create new, refreshable workbooks in Tableau Server.

Connect to Vercel as an ODBC Data Source

To create a data source or workbook in Tableau Desktop and publish the data source or workbook to Tableau server, you will need to configure a DSN on each machine (Desktop and Server), specifying connection properties and creating DSNs using the same name on each machine. Information for connecting to Vercel follows, along with different instructions for configuring a DSN in Windows and Linux environments.

Using API Key Authentication

Vercel uses Bearer token authentication. You can use either a personal access token or an OAuth access token as the API key.

To obtain a personal access token:

1. Log into your Vercel account at https://vercel.com/
2. Navigate to Account Settings > Tokens.
3. Click Create Token, enter a name and expiration, and click Create.
4. Copy the generated token (it will only be shown once).

After obtaining your token, set the following connection properties:

• AuthScheme: Set this to APIKey.
• APIKey: Set this to your Vercel personal access token or OAuth access token.

Example Connection String

Profile=C:\profiles\Vercel.apip;AuthScheme=APIKey;APIKey=your_access_token;

Working with Teams

Many Vercel resources are scoped to a team. To scope all requests to a specific team, set the TeamId connection property to your team's ID. You can find your team ID by querying the Teams table or from the Vercel dashboard. Alternatively, you can specify TeamId in your SQL queries using the WHERE clause where supported.

Connecting to Vercel

Once the authentication is configured, you can connect to Vercel and query data from any of the available tables such as Projects, Deployments, Teams, and Domains.

When you configure the DSN, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

Windows

If you are installing the CData ODBC Driver for Vercel on Windows, DSN configuration is the last step of the driver installation. If you already have the driver installed, or you wish to configure new DSNs, you can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator.

Linux

If you are installing the CData ODBC Driver for Vercel in a Linux environment, the driver installation predefines a system DSN. You can modify the DSN by editing the system data sources file (/etc/odbc.ini) and defining the required connection properties.

/etc/odbc.ini

[CData API Source]
Driver = CData ODBC Driver for Vercel
Description = My Description
Profile = C:\profiles\Vercel.apip
AuthScheme = APIKey
APIKey = your_access_token

For specific information on using these configuration files, please refer to the help documentation (installed and found online).

Publish the Vercel Data Source to Tableau Server

With the connections to Vercel data configured, you are ready to publish a Vercel data source on Tableau, ready to be leveraged by users in your organization to create workbooks based on Vercel data.

Create and Publish a Data Source

1. In the Connect pane, click More -> Other Databases (ODBC). Select CData API Sys, the system DSN.

   The driver installation automatically creates matching user and system DSNs: The system DSN is needed to connect from Tableau Server.

   
2. In the Database menu, select CData.
3. In the Table box, enter a table name or click New Custom SQL to enter an SQL query.
4. Drag the table onto the join area.
5. From the Server menu, click Publish Data Source -> (YOUR DATA SOURCE).
6. Enter the URL to the server. For most instances, you will authenticate with the Tableau Server username and password. Other authentication scenarios can be found below:
   • If Tableau is configured to use Kerberos and your computer has valid Active Directory credentials, Tableau connects to the server.
   • If Tableau is configured to use SAML, a login prompt for your external identity provider is displayed.
   • If Tableau is configured to use Active Directory, enter your Windows username and password.
7. In the resulting dialog, set the Project, Data Source, and other properties. If you want to schedule refreshes, select Embedded Password in the Authentication menu. Click Publish.

You and other users in your organization can now create and share workbooks based on the published data source.

Refresh Workbooks

With a system DSN configured on the client (Tableau Desktop) machine and server (Tableau Server) machine, you can refresh workbooks connected to the Vercel data source. From the Web interface for Tableau Sever, click Data -> (YOUR DATA SOURCE) -> Refresh.

Publish a Completed Workbook with Vercel Data to Tableau Server

If you have a specific Workbook that you wish to share with your organization, you can create the Workbook on Tableau Desktop and publish the Workbook directly to Tableau Server.

1. To connect to Vercel and select data, follow steps 1-5 above.
2. Click Server -> Sign in and configure the connection to the server. For most instances, you will authenticate with the Tableau Server username and password. Other authentication scenarios can be found below:
   • If Tableau is configured to use Kerberos and your computer has valid Active Directory credentials, Tableau connects to the server.
   • If Tableau is configured to use SAML, a login prompt for your external identity provider is displayed.
   • If Tableau is configured to use Active Directory, enter your Windows username and password.
3. With the data selected, select dimensions and measures to visualize and select a type of chart or graph to build your visualization(s).
4. Once the Workbook is complete, click Server -> Publish Workbook to publish the Workbook to Tableau Server.
5. In the resulting dialog, set the Project, Name, Description and other properties. If you want to schedule refreshes, click Edit under Data Sources and change the Authentication option to Embedded Password. Click Publish.

You and other users in your organization can now review the published workbook from Tableau Server.