Use the API Server and Sage 300 ADO.NET Provider in Microsoft Power BI

The CData API Server enables your organization to create Power BI reports based on the current Sage 300 data (plus data from 200+ other ADO.NET Providers). The API Server is a lightweight Web application that runs on your server and, when paired with the ADO.NET Provider for Sage 300, provides secure OData services of Sage 300 data to authorized users. The OData standard enables real-time access to the live data, and support for OData is integrated into Power BI. This article details how to create data visualizations based on Sage 300 OData services in Power BI.

Set Up the API Server

Follow the steps below to begin producing secure Sage 300 OData services:

Deploy

The API Server runs on your own server. On Windows, you can deploy using the stand-alone server or IIS. On a Java servlet container, drop in the API Server WAR file. See the help documentation for more information and how-tos.

The API Server is also easy to deploy on Microsoft Azure, Amazon EC2, and Heroku.

Connect to Sage 300

After you deploy the API Server and the ADO.NET Provider for Sage 300, provide authentication values and other connection properties needed to connect to Sage 300 by clicking Settings -> Connection and adding a new connection in the API Server administration console.

Sage 300 requires some initial setup in order to communicate over the Sage 300 Web API.

• Set up the security groups for the Sage 300 user. Give the Sage 300 user access to the option under Security Groups (per each module required).
• Edit both web.config files in the /Online/Web and /Online/WebApi folders; change the key AllowWebApiAccessForAdmin to true. Restart the webAPI app-pool for the settings to take.
• Once the user access is configured, click https://server/Sage300WebApi/ to ensure access to the web API.

Authenticate to Sage 300 using Basic authentication.

Connect Using Basic Authentication

You must provide values for the following properties to successfully authenticate to Sage 300. Note that the provider reuses the session opened by Sage 300 using cookies. This means that your credentials are used only on the first request to open the session. After that, cookies returned from Sage 300 are used for authentication.

• Url: Set this to the url of the server hosting Sage 300. Construct a URL for the Sage 300 Web API as follows: {protocol}://{host-application-path}/v{version}/{tenant}/ For example, http://localhost/Sage300WebApi/v1.0/-/.
• User: Set this to the username of your account.
• Password: Set this to the password of your account.

When you configure the connection, 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.

You can then choose the Sage 300 entities you want to allow the API Server access to by clicking Settings -> Resources.

Authorize API Server Users

After determining the OData services you want to produce, authorize users by clicking Settings -> Users. The API Server uses authtoken-based authentication and supports the major authentication schemes. Access can also be restricted based on IP address; by default, only connections to the local machine are allowed. You can authenticate as well as encrypt connections with SSL.

Connect to Sage 300

Follow the steps below to connect to Sage 300 data from Power BI.

1. Open Power BI Desktop and click Get Data -> OData Feed. To start Power BI Desktop from PowerBI.com, click the download button and then click Power BI Desktop.

2. Enter the URL to the OData endpoint of the API Server. For example:

   http://MyServer:8032/api.rsc

3. Enter authentication for the API Server. To configure Basic authentication, select Basic and enter the username and authtoken for a user of the OData API of the API Server.

   The API Server also supports Windows authentication using ASP.NET. See the help documentation for more information.

4. In the Navigator, select tables to load. For example, OEInvoices.

   

Create Data Visualizations

After pulling the data into Power BI, you can create data visualizations in the Report view. Follow the steps below to create a pie chart:

1. Select the pie chart icon in the Visualizations pane.
2. Select a dimension in the Fields pane: for example, InvoiceUniquifier.
3. Select a measure in the ApprovedLimit in the Fields pane: for example, ApprovedLimit.

You can change sort options by clicking the ellipsis (...) button for the chart. Options to select the sort column and change the sort order are displayed.

You can use both highlighting and filtering to focus on data. Filtering removes unfocused data from visualizations; highlighting dims unfocused data. You can highlight fields by clicking them:

You can apply filters at the page level, at the report level, or to a single visualization by dragging fields onto the Filters pane. To filter on the field's value, select one of the values that are displayed in the Filters pane.

Click Refresh to synchronize your report with any changes to the data.

Upload Sage 300 Data Reports to Power BI

You can now upload and share reports with other Power BI users in your organization. To upload a dashboard or report, log into PowerBI.com, click Get Data in the main menu and then click Files. Navigate to a Power BI Desktop file or Excel workbook. You can then select the report in the Reports section.

Refresh on Schedule and on Demand

You can configure Power BI to automatically refresh your uploaded report. You can also refresh the dataset on demand in Power BI. Follow the steps below to schedule refreshes through the API Server:

1. Log into Power BI.
2. In the Dataset section, right-click the Sage 300 Dataset and click Schedule Refresh.
3. If you are hosting the API Server on a public-facing server like Azure, you can connect directly. Otherwise, if you are connecting to a feed on your machine, you will need to expand the Gateway Connection node and select a gateway, for example, the Microsoft Power BI Personal Gateway.
4. In the settings for your dataset, expand the Data Source Credentials node and click Edit Credentials.
5. Expand the Schedule Refresh section, select Yes in the Keep Your Data Up to Date menu, and specify the refresh interval.

You can now share real-time Sage 300 reports through Power BI.