Connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central in SpagoBI

The CData JDBC Driver for Dynamics 365 Business Central enables you to connect to live Dynamics 365 Business Central data from business intelligence and data mining tools that support the JDBC standard. This article shows how to integrate Dynamics 365 Business Central data into a report in SpagoBI Studio and host it on SpagoBI Server.

• Deploy the Driver in SpagoBI Server
• Create a Report in SpagoBI Studio
• Host Dynamics 365 Business Central Reports on SpagoBI Server

Deploy the JDBC Driver in SpagoBI Server

Follow the steps to create a JDBC data source for Dynamics 365 Business Central in SpagoBI Server.

1. Copy the driver JAR into %CATALINA_BASE%/lib. These files are located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory.

2. Add a Dynamics 365 Business Central driver resource to the context. The following resource definition can be added to the GlobalNamingResources element in server.xml:

   <Resource name="jdbc/d365businesscentral" auth="Container" type="javax.sql.DataSource" driverclassname="cdata.jdbc.d365businesscentral.D365BusinessCentralDriver" factory="org.apache.tomcat.jdbc.pool.DataSourceFactory" maxactive="20" maxidle="10" maxwait="-1"/>

3. Add the following resource link to give access to Web applications. For this article, add the following line to META-INF\context.xml for SpagoBI.

   <ResourceLink global="jdbc/d365businesscentral" name="jdbc/d365businesscentral" type="javax.sql.DataSource"/>
   

4. Restart the server.

After adding the driver to the resources for the SpagoBI server, add the data source: In SpagoBI, click Resources -> Data Source -> Add and enter the following information:

• Label: Enter a unique identifier for the driver.
• Description: Enter a description for the driver.
• Dialect: Select Default Dialect.
• Read Only: Select the read-only option. This option determines whether the data source is the default database to save datasets created by the end user.
• Type: Select JDBC.
• URL: Enter the JDBC URL using the required connection string properties:

  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.

  Built-in Connection String Designer

  For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Dynamics 365 Business Central JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

  java -jar cdata.jdbc.d365businesscentral.jar
  

  Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

  👁 Using the built-in connection string designer to generate a JDBC URL (Salesforce is shown.)
  

  A typical JDBC URL is below:

  jdbc:d365businesscentral:OrganizationUrl=https://myaccount.financials.dynamics.com/;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;
  

• Driver: Enter the class name for the driver: cdata.jdbc.d365businesscentral.D365BusinessCentralDriver

👁 The configuration for the Dynamics 365 Business Central JDBC data source. (Salesforce is shown.)

Create Reports in SpagoBI Studio

Follow the steps below to populate reports based on Dynamics 365 Business Central data in SpagoBI Studio. You will create a dataset that populates a chart with the results of an SQL query. In the next section, you will host this report on SpagoBI Server.

First, you will need to connect to Dynamics 365 Business Central data from a report in SpagoBI Studio:

1. In SpagoBI Studio, click File -> New -> Project and select Report Project in the Business Intelligence and Reporting Tools folder.
2. Click File -> New -> Report and select Blank Report.
3. In the Data Explorer view, right-click Data Sources and click New Data Source.
4. Select JDBC Data Source and enter a name for the data source.
5. Click Manage Drivers and click Add to add the driver JAR, cdata.jdbc.d365businesscentral.jar. The driver JAR is located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory.
6. In the Driver Class menu, select the driver class, cdata.jdbc.d365businesscentral.D365BusinessCentralDriver.
7. In the Database URL box, enter the JDBC URL. A typical JDBC URL is below:

   jdbc:d365businesscentral:OrganizationUrl=https://myaccount.financials.dynamics.com/;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;
   

   See the "Getting Started" chapter of the driver help for a guide to obtaining the required connection properties. 👁 The JDBC data source. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

After you have connected to Dynamics 365 Business Central data, create a dataset that contains the results of an SQL query:

1. Right-click the DataSet folder and click New Data Set. Select the JDBC data source for Dynamics 365 Business Central and enter a name for the dataset.
2. Build the SQL query. In this example, this query will be used to add a chart to the dashboard. For example:

   SELECT accountid, Name FROM Accounts
   

   👁 The query to be used to populate a chart. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

You can use the dataset to populate report objects. Follow the steps below to create a chart.

1. In the Palette view, drag a chart onto the canvas.
2. In the Select Chart Type tab, select a bar chart.
3. In the Select Data tab, click the Use Data From option and select the Dynamics 365 Business Central data set from the menu.
4. Drag accountid from the table to the series for the x-axis.
5. Drag Name from the table to the series for the y-axis. 👁 Columns in the dataset defined as the x- and y-axes for the chart. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

Host Dynamics 365 Business Central Reports on SpagoBI Server

Follow the steps below to host documents based on live Dynamics 365 Business Central data on SpagoBI Server. You will use the report you created in the previous section as a template. To enable report users to access the live data, create placeholder parameters to be replaced by the Dynamics 365 Business Central JDBC data source on the server:

1. If you have not already done so, open the Report Design perspective in SpagoBI Studio.
2. In the Data Explorer view, right-click the Report Parameters folder and click New Parameter. Add the url parameter and assign an empty value to it. This parameter is a placeholder for the JDBC data source on the SpagoBI Server.
3. Right-click the Dynamics 365 Business Central data source and click Edit.

4. In the Property Binding node, set the JDBC Driver URL binding property to the url parameter: Click the box for the property. In the Category section, select Report Parameters. Select All in the Subcategory section and double-click the parameter.

   You can also enter the following in the JavaScript syntax:

   params["url"].value
   

   👁 Placeholder values in the report for the JDBC data source on the server.
   

Next, create a new document for the report on SpagoBI Server.

1. In SpagoBI Server, click Documents Development -> Create Document -> Generic Document. The Document Details page is displayed.
2. To create the document, enter the following:
   • Label: Enter a unique identifier for the document.
   • Name: Enter a user-friendly name for the document.
   • Type: Select Report from the menu.
   • Engine: Select BIRT Report Engine.
   • Data Source: Select the Dynamics 365 Business Central Data Source you created in Create a JDBC Data Source for Dynamics 365 Business Central in SpagoBI Server.
3. In the Show Document Templates section, select the folder where you want the document to be stored.

4. In the Template section, click Choose File. Navigate to the folder containing your report project. Select the .rptdesign file.

   Note: You can find the path to the project in the project properties.

5. Click the Save button.

👁 The document using the report as a template. (Salesforce is shown.)

When you run the report on the server, the placeholder url parameter is replaced with the JDBC URL defined on the server.

👁 The chart running on the SpagoBI Server. (Salesforce is shown.)