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Build OData Visualizations in Tableau Cloud
Use CData Connect Cloud to connect to live OData services and build visualizations in Tableau Cloud.
Tableau Cloud is an analytics platform fully hosted in the cloud. When paired with CData Connect Cloud, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to OData services for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to connect to OData and build visualizations from OData services in Tableau Cloud.
CData Connect Cloud provides a pure SQL Server, cloud-to-cloud interface for OData, allowing you to easily build visualizations from live OData services in Tableau Cloud without installing connectors or publishing worksheets and data sources from Tableau Desktop. As you build visualizations, Tableau Cloud generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Cloud pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to OData, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return OData services.
About OData Data Integration
CData simplifies access and integration of live OData services data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:
- Access OData versions 2.0, 3.0, and 4.0, working with legacy services and the latest features and capabilities.
- Leverage advanced query options, including $filter, $select, and $expand, enhancing data retrieval from 3rd party tools.
- Use Server-side execution of aggregation and grouping to minimize data transfer and boost performance.
- Authenticate securely using a variety of schemes, including Azure AD, digest, negotiate, NTLM, OAuth, and more means secure authentication with every connection.
- Use SQL stored procedures to manage OData service entities - listing, creating, and removing associations between entities.
Customers use CData's solutions to regularly integrate their OData services with preferred tools, such as Power BI, MicroStrategy, or Tableau, and to replicate data from OData services to their databases or data warehouses.
Getting Started
About OData Data Integration
CData simplifies access and integration of live OData services data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:
- Access OData versions 2.0, 3.0, and 4.0, working with legacy services and the latest features and capabilities.
- Leverage advanced query options, including $filter, $select, and $expand, enhancing data retrieval from 3rd party tools.
- Use Server-side execution of aggregation and grouping to minimize data transfer and boost performance.
- Authenticate securely using a variety of schemes, including Azure AD, digest, negotiate, NTLM, OAuth, and more means secure authentication with every connection.
- Use SQL stored procedures to manage OData service entities - listing, creating, and removing associations between entities.
Customers use CData's solutions to regularly integrate their OData services with preferred tools, such as Power BI, MicroStrategy, or Tableau, and to replicate data from OData services to their databases or data warehouses.
Getting Started
Configure OData Connectivity for Tableau Cloud
Connectivity to OData from Tableau Cloud is made possible through CData Connect Cloud. To work with OData services from Tableau Cloud, we start by creating and configuring a OData connection.
- Log into Connect Cloud, click Connections and click Add Connection
![]( "Adding a Connection")
- Select "OData" from the Add Connection panel
![]( "Selecting a data source")
-
Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to OData.
The User and Password properties, under the Authentication section, must be set to valid OData user credentials. In addition, you will need to specify a URL to a valid OData server organization root or OData services file.
![]( "Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)")
- Click Create & Test
- Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add OData Connection page and update the User-based permissions.
![]( "Updating permissions")
Add a Personal Access Token
If you are connecting from a service, application, platform, or framework that does not support OAuth authentication, you can create a Personal Access Token (PAT) to use for authentication. Best practices would dictate that you create a separate PAT for each service, to maintain granularity of access.
- Click on your username at the top right of the Connect Cloud app and click User Profile.
- On the User Profile page, scroll down to the Personal Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
- Give your PAT a name and click Create.
![]( "Creating a new PAT")
- 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, you are ready to connect to OData services from Tableau Cloud.
Visualize Live OData Services in Tableau Cloud
The steps below outline creating a new data source in Tableau Cloud based on the virtual OData database in Connect Cloud and building a simple visualization from the data.
- Log into Tableau Cloud, select a account, and create a new workbook.
- In the new workbook, choose the Microsoft SQL Server Connector from the data wizard and fill in the values for your Connect Cloud instance.
- Set Server to tds.cdata.com,14333
- Set Database to the OData connection you created (e.g. OData1)
- Set Username to your Connect Cloud username (e.g. user@mydomain.com)
- Set Password to a PAT for the above user
- Check the Require SSL checkbox
![]( "Connect to Connect Cloud from Tableau Cloud")
- Select your newly created database and the table(s) you wish to visualize (defining relationships for JOINad tables as needed).
- Select Dimensions and Measures and configure your visualization.
Real-Time Access to OData Services from Cloud Applications
At this point, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live OData services from your Tableau Cloud workbook. You can create new visualizations, build dashboards, and more, with no need to publish data sources and workbooks from Tableau Desktop. For more information on gaining live access to data from more than 100 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources from cloud applications like Tableau Cloud, refer to our Connect Cloud page.
