Create Avalara AvaTax-Connected Applications in Appsmith

Appsmith is an open-source internal tool builder that allows teams to quickly and easily build a UI to help improve their business operations. When combined with CData Connect Cloud, you gain immediate access to Avalara AvaTax data for business applications. This article outlines the process of connecting to Avalara AvaTax using Connect Cloud and creating a basic application from Avalara AvaTax data within Appsmith.

CData Connect Cloud offers a pure SQL Server, cloud-to-cloud interface for Avalara AvaTax, enabling the creation of business applications directly from live Avalara AvaTax data within Appsmith, all without the need for data replication to a native database. As you build applications, Appsmith generates SQL queries to gather data. With its inherent optimized data processing capabilities, CData Connect Cloud efficiently channels all supported SQL operations, including filters and JOINs, directly to Avalara AvaTax. This leverages server-side processing to swiftly deliver the requested Avalara AvaTax data.

Configure Avalara AvaTax Connectivity for Appsmith

Connectivity to Avalara AvaTax from Appsmith is made possible through CData Connect Cloud. To work with Avalara AvaTax data from Appsmith, we start by creating and configuring a Avalara AvaTax connection.

1. Log into Connect Cloud, click Connections and click Add Connection
2. Select "Avalara AvaTax" from the Add Connection panel
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Avalara AvaTax.

   The primary method for performing basic authentication is to provide your login credentials, as follows:

   • User: Set this to your username.
   • Password: Set this to your password.

   Optionally, if you are making use of a sandbox environment, set the following:

   • UseSandbox: Set this to true if you are authenticating with a sandbox account.

   Authenticating Using Account Number and License Key

   Alternatively, you can authenticate using your account number and license key. Connect to data using the following:

   • AccountId: Set this to your Account Id. The Account Id is listed in the upper right hand corner of the admin console.
   • LicenseKey: Set this to your Avalara Avatax license key. You can generate a license key by logging into Avalara Avatax as an account administrator and navigating to Settings -> Reset License Key.
   
4. Click Create & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Avalara AvaTax Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect Cloud through the REST API, the OData API, or the Virtual SQL Server, a Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect Cloud. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each service to maintain granularity of access.

1. Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect Cloud app to open the settings page.
2. On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
3. Give the PAT a name and click Create.
4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured and a PAT generated, we are ready to connect to Avalara AvaTax data from Appsmith.

Create an Appsmith Application from live Avalara AvaTax Data

To establish a connection from Appsmith to the CData Connect Cloud Virtual SQL Server, follow these steps:

Connect to Avalara AvaTax in Appsmith

1. Log in to your Appsmith instance and create a new application.
2. In the new application, open the Data page and select Bring your data.
3. On this page, you can search for Microsoft SQL Server and select it as your data source.
4. Enter a name for the new data source and then enter the following connection settings:
   • Host address: tds.cdata.com
   • Port: 14333
   • Database name: enter the Connection Name of the CData Connect Cloud data source you want to connect to (for example, AvalaraAvatax1).
   • Username: enter your CData Connect Cloud username. This is displayed in the top-right corner of the CData Connect Cloud interface. For example, test@cdata.com.
   • Password: enter the PAT you previously generated.
   
5. Click Test configuration to confirm a successful connection, then click Save to save the datasource.

Create a new query

With a connection configured to a datasource, we can add a SQL query to actually retrieve data from the data source.

1. On the screen with the new data source, click New Query.
2. This opens the Query Editor to enter a SQL query to select data. To assist with specifying a SQL query, use the Explorer of CData Connect Cloud to preview the SQL queries and the data you want to retrieve.
3. After creating the SQL query, return to the Query Editor in Appsmith and enter the SQL query, then click Run.
4. Once the query successfully runs, all that remains is to set up the Page to display the data retrieved.

Display Avalara AvaTax data

1. Open the UI tab and click New UI element.
2. Choose a new UI element to grab, then drag and place the element on the page.
3. Click Connect data on the new UI element, then select the query previously created.
4. With the data connected, it is then displayed in the UI element.

Deploy the application

With the Avalara AvaTax data connected to the UI elements in the application, we can deploy the Application. To do this, click Deploy in the top-right corner of Appsmith, then the application is opened in a seperate window displaying the Avalara AvaTax data.

Get CData Connect Cloud

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