Visualize Live Avalara AvaTax Data in Power BI (via CData Connect AI)

Power BI transforms your company's data into rich visuals for you to collect and organize so you can focus on what matters to you. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get access to Avalara AvaTax data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to use CData Connect to create a live connection to Avalara AvaTax, connect to Avalara AvaTax data from Power BI and then create reports on Avalara AvaTax data in Power BI.

Configure Avalara AvaTax Connectivity for Power BI

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

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

2. Select "Avalara AvaTax" from the Add Connection panel
👁 Selecting a data source

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

With the connection configured, you are ready to connect to Avalara AvaTax data from Power BI.

Query Avalara AvaTax Tables

Follow the steps below to build a query to pull Avalara AvaTax data into the report:

1. Open Power BI Desktop and click Get Data -> Online Services -> CData Connect AI and click "Connect"
2. Click "Sign in" and authenticate with your CData Connect AI account 👁 Authenticating with Connect AI
   
3. After signing in, click "Connect" 👁 Connecting to Connect AI
   
4. Select tables in the Navigator dialog 👁 The available tables. (Salesforce tables are shown)
   
5. Click Load to establish the connection to your Avalara AvaTax data from Power BI

Create Avalara AvaTax Data Visualizations

After connecting to the data into Power BI, you can create data visualizations in the Report view by dragging fields from the Fields pane onto the canvas. Select the dimensions and measures you wish to visualize along with the chart type.

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

Live Access to Avalara AvaTax Data from Data Applications

With CData Connect AI you have a direct connection to Avalara AvaTax data from Power BI. You can import more data, create new visualizations, build reports, and more — all without replicating Avalara AvaTax data.

To get SQL data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources (including Avalara AvaTax) directly from your on-premise BI, reporting, ETL and other data applications, visit the CData Connect AI page and start a free trial.