Create Adobe Analytics-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 AI, you gain immediate access to Adobe Analytics data for business applications. This article outlines the process of connecting to Adobe Analytics using Connect AI and creating a basic application from Adobe Analytics data within Appsmith.

CData Connect AI offers a pure SQL Server, cloud-to-cloud interface for Adobe Analytics, enabling the creation of business applications directly from live Adobe Analytics 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 AI efficiently channels all supported SQL operations, including filters and JOINs, directly to Adobe Analytics. This leverages server-side processing to swiftly deliver the requested Adobe Analytics data.

Configure Adobe Analytics Connectivity for Appsmith

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

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection
👁 Adding a Connection

2. Select "Adobe Analytics" from the Add Connection panel
👁 Selecting a data source

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Adobe Analytics.

   Adobe Analytics uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate using OAuth, create an app to obtain the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties. See the "Getting Started" section of the help documentation for a guide.

   Retrieving GlobalCompanyId

   GlobalCompanyId is a required connection property. If you do not know your Global Company ID, you can find it in the request URL for the users/me endpoint on the Swagger UI. After logging into the Swagger UI Url, expand the users endpoint and then click the GET users/me button. Click the Try it out and Execute buttons. Note your Global Company ID shown in the Request URL immediately preceding the users/me endpoint.

   Retrieving Report Suite Id

   Report Suite ID (RSID) is also a required connection property. In the Adobe Analytics UI, navigate to Admin -> Report Suites and you will get a list of your report suites along with their identifiers next to the name.

   After setting the GlobalCompanyId, RSID and OAuth connection properties, you are ready to connect to Adobe Analytics.

   👁 Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)
   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Adobe Analytics Connection page and update the User-based permissions. 👁 Updating permissions
   

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect AI 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 AI. 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 AI 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. 👁 Creating a new PAT
   
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 Adobe Analytics data from Appsmith.

Create an Appsmith Application from live Adobe Analytics Data

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

Connect to Adobe Analytics 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. 👁 Open the Data page
   
3. On this page, you can search for Microsoft SQL Server and select it as your data source. 👁 Select Microsoft SQL Server datasource
   
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 AI data source you want to connect to (for example, AdobeAnalytics1).
   • Username: enter your CData Connect AI username. This is displayed in the top-right corner of the CData Connect AI interface. For example, [email protected].
   • Password: enter the PAT you previously generated.
   👁 Configure the connection to the Connect AI Virtual SQL Server (Salesforce shown)
   
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. 👁 Create a 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 AI to preview the SQL queries and the data you want to retrieve. 👁 Preview queries in the Explorer
   
3. After creating the SQL query, return to the Query Editor in Appsmith and enter the SQL query, then click Run. 👁 Run the SQL query
   
4. Once the query successfully runs, all that remains is to set up the Page to display the data retrieved.

Display Adobe Analytics data

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

Deploy the application

With the Adobe Analytics 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 separate window displaying the Adobe Analytics data.

👁 Application deployed

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