Build BigQuery Visualizations in Tableau Desktop

Tableau is a visual analytics platform transforming the way businesses use data to solve problems. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to BigQuery data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to connect to BigQuery and build visualizations from BigQuery data in Tableau.

Getting Started

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CData Connect AI provides a pure SQL Server, cloud-to-cloud interface for BigQuery, allowing you to easily build visualizations from live BigQuery data in Tableau without installing connectors. As you build visualizations, Tableau generates SQL queries to gather data. 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 BigQuery data.

Configure BigQuery Connectivity for Tableau

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

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

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

3. BigQuery uses OAuth to authenticate. Click "Sign in" to authenticate with BigQuery. 👁 Authenticating with OAuth (Salesforce is shown).
   
4. 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.

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, you are ready to connect to BigQuery data from Tableau.

Visualize Live BigQuery Data in Tableau

To establish a connection from Tableau Desktop to the CData Connect AI Virtual SQL Server, follow these steps.

1. In Tableau Desktop, open a new book. Under To a Server, select More, then Microsoft SQL Server. 👁 Selecting Microsoft SQL Server as the connection type.
   
2. Enter your credentials:
   • Server: enter the Virtual SQL Server endpoint and port separated by a comma: tds.cdata.com,14333
   • Database: enter the Connection Name of the CData Connect AI data source you want to connect to (for example, GoogleBigQuery1).
   • Authentication: select Use a specific username and password.
   • 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.
   • Require SSL: leave this selected.
   👁 Configuring the connection to the Virtual SQL Server API.
   
3. Click Sign In.
4. Select the Database (Connect AI connection) you wish to work with and opt for a Live or Extract Connection type.
5. Select the table(s) you wish to visualize. If you select multiple tables, define the relationship between the tables using the appropriate columns. 👁 Selecting tables to visualize (Salesforce is shown)
   
6. Select the fields to visualize. 👁 Visualizing live data (Salesforce is shown).
   

Real-Time Access to BigQuery Data from Data Applications

At this point, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live BigQuery data from your Tableau workbook. You can create new visualizations, build dashboards, and more. For more information on gaining live access to data from more than 100 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources from applications like Tableau, refer to our Connect AI page.