Use the CData ODBC Driver for BigCommerce in MicroStrategy Desktop

MicroStrategy is an analytics and mobility platform that enables data-driven innovation. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for BigCommerce, you gain database-like access to live BigCommerce data from MicroStrategy, expanding your reporting and analytics capabilities. In this article, we walk through adding BigCommerce as a data source in MicroStrategy Desktop and creating a simple visualization of BigCommerce data.

The CData ODBC Driver offers unmatched performance for interacting with live BigCommerce data in MicroStrategy due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from MicroStrategy to BigCommerce, the driver pushes supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to BigCommerce and utilizes the embedded SQL Engine to process unsupported operations (often SQL functions and JOIN operations) client-side. With built-in dynamic metadata querying, you can visualize and analyze BigCommerce data using native MicroStrategy data types.

Connect to BigCommerce as an ODBC Data Source

Information for connecting to BigCommerce follows, along with different instructions for configuring a DSN in Windows and Linux environments.

BigCommerce authentication is based on the standard OAuth flow. To authenticate, you must initially create an app via the Big Commerce developer platform where you can obtain an OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL. These three parameters will be set as connection properties to your driver.

Additionally, in order to connect to your BigCommerce Store, you will need your StoreId. To find your Store Id please follow these steps:

1. Log in to your BigCommerce account.
2. From the Home Page, select Advanced Settings > API Accounts.
3. Click Create API Account.
4. A text box named API Path will appear on your screen.
5. Inside you can see a URL of the following structure: https://api.bigcommerce.com/stores/{Store Id}/v3.
6. As demonstrated above, your Store Id will be between the 'stores/' and '/v3' path paramters.
7. Once you have retrieved your Store Id you can either click Cancel or proceed in creating an API Account in case you do not have one already.

When you configure the DSN, 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.

Windows

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

Linux

If you are installing the CData ODBC Driver for BigCommerce in a Linux environment, the driver installation predefines a system DSN. You can modify the DSN by editing the system data sources file (/etc/odbc.ini) and defining the required connection properties.

/etc/odbc.ini

[CData BigCommerce Sys]
Driver = CData ODBC Driver for BigCommerce
Description = My Description
OAuthClientId = YourClientId
 OAuthClientSecret = YourClientSecret
 StoreId = 'YourStoreID'
 CallbackURL = 'http://localhost:33333'
InitiateOAuth = GETANDREFRESH

For specific information on using these configuration files, please refer to the help documentation (installed and found online).

Connect to and Visualize BigCommerce Data using MicroStrategy Desktop

In addition to connecting BigCommerce in MicroStrategy enterprise products, you can connect to BigCommerce in MicroStrategy Desktop. Follow the steps below to add BigCommerce data as a dataset and create visualizations and reports of BigCommerce data.

1. Open MicroStrategy Desktop and create a new dossier.
2. In the datasets panel, click New Data, select Databases, and select Type a Query as the Import Option.
3. Add a new data source and choose DSN data sources.
4. Choose the DSN you previously configured (likely CData BigCommerce Sys) and select Generic DBMS in the Version menu.
5. Set the User and Password properties for the DSN (or use placeholder values) and name the data source.
👁 Creating a new data source for BigCommerce.

6. Select the new database instance to view the tables. You may need to manually click the search icon in the Available Tables section to see the tables.
7. Create a SQL query for the BigCommerce data (see below) and click Execute SQL to test the query.

   SELECT * FROM Customers
   

   👁 Querying BigCommerce for data.
   NOTE: Since we create a live connection, we can execute a SELECT * query and utilize the filtering and aggregation features native to the MicroStrategy products.
8. Click Finish and choose to connect live.
9. Choose a visualization, choose fields to display (data types are discovered automatically through dynamic metadata discovery) and apply any filters to create a new visualization of BigCommerce data. Where possible, the complex queries generated by the filters and aggregations will be pushed down to BigCommerce, while any unsupported operations (which can include SQL functions and JOIN operations) will be managed client-side by the CData SQL Engine embedded in the driver. 👁 Visualize BigCommerce data.
   
10. Once you are finished configuring the dossier, click File -> Save.

Using the CData ODBC Driver for BigCommerce in MicroStrategy Desktop, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on BigCommerce data. Read our other articles on connecting to BigCommerce in MicroStrategy and connecting to BigCommerce in MicroStrategy Web for more examples.