Configure the CData JDBC Driver for Xero WorkflowMax in a Connection Pool in Tomcat

The CData JDBC Drivers support standard JDBC interfaces to integrate with Web applications running on the JVM. This article details how to connect to Xero WorkflowMax data from a connection pool in Tomcat.

Connect to Xero WorkflowMax Data through a Connection Pool in Tomcat

1. Copy the CData JAR and CData .lic file to $CATALINA_HOME/lib. The CData JAR is located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory.
2. Add a definition of the resource to the context. Specify the JDBC URL here.

   To connect to the WorkflowMax API, obtain an APIKey and AccountKey from Xero. This can only be done by contacting Xero support (https://www.workflowmax.com/contact-us).

   After obtaining an API Key and Account Key, set the values in the APIKey and AccountKey connection properties. Once these are set, you are ready to connect.

   Built-in Connection String Designer

   For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Xero WorkflowMax JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

   java -jar cdata.jdbc.xeroworkflowmax.jar

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

   You can see the JDBC URL specified in the resource definition below.

   <Resource name="jdbc/xeroworkflowmax" auth="Container" type="javax.sql.DataSource" driverClassName="cdata.jdbc.xeroworkflowmax.XeroWorkflowMaxDriver" factory="org.apache.tomcat.jdbc.pool.DataSourceFactory" url="jdbc:xeroworkflowmax:APIKey=myApiKey;AccountKey=myAccountKey;" maxActive="20" maxIdle="10" maxWait="-1" />

   To allow a single application to access Xero WorkflowMax data, add the code above to the context.xml in the application's META-INF directory.

   For a shared resource configuration, add the code above to the context.xml located in $CATALINA_BASE/conf. A shared resource configuration provides connectivity to Xero WorkflowMax for all applications.

3. Add a reference to the resource to the web.xml for the application. Xero WorkflowMax data JSP jdbc/XeroWorkflowMax javax.sql.DataSource Container
4. Initialize connections from the connection pool: Context initContext = new InitialContext(); Context envContext = (Context)initContext.lookup("java:/comp/env"); DataSource ds = (DataSource)envContext.lookup("jdbc/XeroWorkflowMax"); Connection conn = ds.getConnection();

More Tomcat Integration

The steps above show how to connect to Xero WorkflowMax data in a simple connection pooling scenario. For more use cases and information, see the JNDI Datasource How-To in the Tomcat documentation.