Nintex Workflow Cloud is a cloud-based platform where you can design workflows to automate simple or complex processes using drag-and-drop interactions — without writing any code. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to BigQuery data for business applications. This article shows how to create a virtual database for BigQuery in Connect AI and build a simple workflow from BigQuery data in Nintex.
CData Connect AI provides a pure, cloud-to-cloud interface for BigQuery, allowing you to build workflows from live BigQuery data in Nintex Workflow Cloud — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Nintex allows you to access data directly using SQL queries. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to BigQuery, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return the requested BigQuery data.
About BigQuery Data Integration
CData simplifies access and integration of live Google BigQuery data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:
- Simplify access to BigQuery with broad out-of-the-box support for authentication schemes, including OAuth, OAuth JWT, and GCP Instance.
- Enhance data workflows with Bi-directional data access between BigQuery and other applications.
- Perform key BigQuery actions like starting, retrieving, and canceling jobs; deleting tables; or insert job loads through SQL stored procedures.
Most CData customers are using Google BigQuery as their data warehouse and so use CData solutions to migrate business data from separate sources into BigQuery for comprehensive analytics. Other customers use our connectivity to analyze and report on their Google BigQuery data, with many customers using both solutions.
For more details on how CData enhances your Google BigQuery experience, check out our blog post: https://www.cdata.com/blog/what-is-bigquery
Getting Started
Configure BigQuery Connectivity for Nintex
Connectivity to BigQuery from Nintex is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with BigQuery data from Nintex, we start by creating and configuring a BigQuery connection.
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Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection
👁 Adding a Connection
- Select "BigQuery" from the Add Connection panel
👁 Selecting a data source
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BigQuery uses OAuth to authenticate. Click "Sign in" to authenticate with BigQuery.
👁 Authenticating with OAuth (Salesforce is shown).
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Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add BigQuery 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.
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Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open the settings page.
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On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
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Give the PAT a name and click Create.
👁 Creating a new PAT
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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, you are ready to connect to BigQuery data from Nintex Workflow Cloud.
Connect to BigQuery from Nintex
The steps below outline creating a new connection to BigQuery data from Nintex (via Connect AI).
- Log into Nintex Workflow Cloud
- In the Connections tab, click "Add new"
- Select "Microsoft SQL Server" as the connector and click "Connect"
👁 Adding a new SQL Server Connection
- In the SQL Server connection wizard, set the following properties:
- Connection Name: Connect AI
- Username: a Connect AI username (e.g. [email protected])
- Password: the Connect AI user's PAT
- Database Host: tds.cdata.com:14333
- Database Name: the BigQuery connection (a.g., GoogleBigQuery1)
👁 Configuring the Connection to Connect AI
- Click "Connect"
- Configure the connection permissions and click "Save permissions"
👁 Configuring permissions and saving the Connection
Create a Simple BigQuery Workflow
With the connection to CData Connect AI configured, we are ready to build a simple workflow to access BigQuery data. Start by clicking the "Create workflow" button.
Configure the Start Event Action
- Click the start event task and select the "Form" event
- Click "Design form"
- Drag a "Text - Long" element onto the Form and click the element to configure it
- Set "Title" to "Enter SQL query"
- Set "Required" to true
- Drag a "Text - Short" element onto the Form and click the element to configure it
- Set "Title" to "Enter desired result column"
- Set "Required" to true
👁 Designing the Start event Form
Configure an "Execute a Query" Action
- Add an "Execute a query" action after the "Start event: Form" action and click to configure the action
- Set "SQL Script" to the "Enter SQL Query" variable from the "Start event" action
- Set "Column to retrieve" to the "Enter desired result column" variable from the "Start event" action
- Set "Retrieved column" to a new variable (a.g., "values")
👁 Configuring the SQL Server query action
Configure a "Send an Email" Action
- Add a "Send an email" action after the "Execute a query" action and click to configure the action
- Set the "Recipient email address"
- Set the "Subject"
- Set the "Message body" to the variable created for the retrieved column
👁 Configuring the email action
Once you configure the actions, click "Save," name the Workflow, and click "Save" again. You now have a simple workflow that will query BigQuery using SQL and sand an email with the results.
To learn more about live data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your cloud applications, check out the CData Connect AI page. Sign up for a free trial and reach out to our Support Team if you have any questions.
