Connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central Data from HeidiSQL

HeidiSQL is an open-source database administration tool that natively supports MariaDB, MySQL, SQL Server, and PostgreSQL. When paired with CData Connect AI, HediSQL reach extends to include access to live Dynamics 365 Business Central data. This article demonstrates how to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central using Connect AI and query Dynamics 365 Business Central data in HeidiSQL.

CData Connect AI provides a pure SQL Server interface for Dynamics 365 Business Central, allowing you to query data from Dynamics 365 Business Central without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to Dynamics 365 Business Central, leveraging server-side processing to return the requested Dynamics 365 Business Central data quickly.

Configure Dynamics 365 Business Central Connectivity for HeidiSQL

Connectivity to Dynamics 365 Business Central from HeidiSQL is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with Dynamics 365 Business Central data from HeidiSQL, we start by creating and configuring a Dynamics 365 Business Central connection.

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

2. Select "Dynamics 365 Business Central" from the Add Connection panel
👁 Selecting a data source

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central.

   To authenticate to Dynamics 365 Business Central, you must select an AuthScheme and provide the required properties (OAuth by default).

   All Methods

   Specify the . If you have multiple companies in your organization, you must also specify the to indicate which company you would like to connect to. does not need to be specified if you have only one company.

   Access Key

   To authenticate with an Access Key, set AuthScheme to "AccessKey" and provide the and properties.

   To obtain the and values, navigate to the Users page in Dynamics 365 Business Central and then click on Edit. The User Name and Web Service Access Key values are what you will enter as the and connection string properties. Note that the User Name is not your email address. It is a shortened user name.

   If you wish to authenticate through other methods, refer to the Help documentation.

   👁 Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)
   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Dynamics 365 Business Central 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 Dynamics 365 Business Central data from HeidiSQL.

Connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central from HeidiSQL using Connect AI

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

Create a new HeidiSQL Session

1. In the Session Manager, select New in the bottom-left
2. Give the new session a descriptive name, e.g. Connect-Cloud-Dynamics 365 Business Central
👁 Creating a new session in HeidiSQL.

Configure a SQL Server Connection to Connect AI

1. In the session settings, set the Network type to Microsoft SQL Server (TCP/IP)
2. The Library DLL should automatically update to MSOLEDBSQL
3. Set the Hostname/IP to tds.cdata.com
4. Set the User to your CData Connect AI username. This is displayed in the top-right corner of the CData Connect AI interface. For example, [email protected]
5. Set the Password to your PAT created in Connect AI in the previous section.
6. Set the Port to 14333 👁 Configuring a SQL Server connection to Connect AI
   

Query Dynamics 365 Business Central from HeidiSQL

1. In the database listing on the left, find your connection to Dynamics 365 Business Central configured earlier.
2. Expand this connection to view individual tables or data objects present within Dynamics 365 Business Central.
3. Write custom SQL queries targeting these tables, treating the data source like any SQL Server database, or visually explore each tabular data set by selecting the relevant tables 👁 Querying within HeidiSQL.
   

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