Build Dynamics 365 Business Central Visualizations in Tableau Cloud

Tableau Cloud is an analytics platform fully hosted in the cloud. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get instant, cloud-to-cloud access to Dynamics 365 Business Central data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central and build visualizations from Dynamics 365 Business Central data in Tableau Cloud.

CData Connect AI provides a pure cloud-to-cloud interface for Dynamics 365 Business Central, allowing you to easily build visualizations from live Dynamics 365 Business Central data in Tableau Cloud without installing connectors or publishing worksheets and data sources from Tableau Desktop. As you build visualizations, Tableau Cloud 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 Dynamics 365 Business Central, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return Dynamics 365 Business Central data.

Configure Dynamics 365 Business Central Connectivity for Tableau Cloud

To work with Dynamics 365 Business Central data from Tableau Cloud, we need to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central from Connect AI, provide user access to the connection, and create a Workspace for the Dynamics 365 Business Central data.

Connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central from Connect AI

CData Connect AI uses a straightforward, point-and-click interface to connect to data sources.

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.

Configure Dynamics 365 Business Central Endpoints for Tableau Cloud

After connecting to Dynamics 365 Business Central, create a workspace for your desired table(s).

1. Navigate to the Workspaces page and click Add to create a new Workspace (or select an existing workspace). 👁 The Workspaces page.
   👁 Adding a new Workspace.
   
2. Click Add to add new assets to the Workspace.
3. Select the Dynamics 365 Business Central connection (e.g. D365BusinessCentral1) and click Next. 👁 Selecting an Asset (Salesforce is shown).
   
4. Select the table(s) you wish to work with and click Confirm. 👁 Selecting Tables (Salesforce is shown).
   
5. Make note of the OData Service URL for your workspace, e.g. https://cloud.cdata.com/api/odata/{workspace_name}

With the connection, PAT, and Workspace configured, you are ready to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central data from Tableau Cloud.

Visualize Live Dynamics 365 Business Central Data in Tableau Cloud

The steps below outline creating a new data source in Tableau Cloud based on the virtual Dynamics 365 Business Central database in Connect AI and building a simple visualization from the data.

1. Log into Tableau Cloud, select a account, and create a new workbook.
2. In the new workbook, choose the OData Connector from the data wizard and fill in the values for your Connect AI instance. 👁 Selecting OData connector in Tableau Cloud
   
   • Set Server to the OData URL for your Workspace, e.g. https://cloud.cdata.com/api/odata/{workspace_name}
   • Set Authentication to Username and Password
   • Set Username to your Connect AI username (e.g. [email protected])
   • Set Password to a PAT for the above user
   👁 Connect to Connect AI from Tableau Cloud
   
3. Select your newly created database and the table(s) you wish to visualize (defining relationships for JOINad tables as needed).
👁 Choosing a Database and Tables

4. Select Dimensions and Measures and configure your visualization.
👁 Visualizing Dynamics 365 Business Central data in Tableau Cloud

Real-Time Access to Dynamics 365 Business Central Data from Cloud Applications

At this point, you have a direct, cloud-to-cloud connection to live Dynamics 365 Business Central data from your Tableau Cloud workbook. You can create new visualizations, build dashboards, and more, with no need to publish data sources and workbooks from Tableau Desktop. For more information on gaining live access to data from more than 100 SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources from cloud applications like Tableau Cloud, refer to our Connect AI page.