Create Informatica Mappings From/To a JDBC Data Source for Discourse

Informatica provides a powerful, elegant means of transporting and transforming your data. By utilizing the CData JDBC Driver for Discourse, you are gaining access to a driver based on industry-proven standards that integrates seamlessly with Informatica's powerful data transportation and manipulation features. This tutorial shows how to transfer and browse Discourse data in Informatica PowerCenter.

Deploy the Driver

To deploy the driver to the Informatica PowerCenter server, copy the CData JAR and .lic file, located in the lib subfolder in the installation directory, to the following folder: Informatica-installation-directory\services\shared\jars\thirdparty.

To work with Discourse data in the Developer tool, you will need to copy the CData JAR and .lic file, located in the lib subfolder in the installation directory, into the following folders:

• Informatica-installation-directory\client\externaljdbcjars
• Informatica-installation-directory\externaljdbcjars

Create the JDBC Connection

Follow the steps below to connect from Informatica Developer:

1. In the Connection Explorer pane, right-click your domain and click Create a Connection.
2. In the New Database Connection wizard that is displayed, enter a name and Id for the connection and in the Type menu select JDBC.
3. In the JDBC Driver Class Name property, enter:

   cdata.jdbc.api.APIDriver

4. In the Connection String property, enter the JDBC URL, using the connection properties for Discourse.

   The Discourse API uses API Key authentication.

   Using API Key Authentication

   Discourse requires API Key and Username for authentication. API Keys are generated in the Discourse Admin panel under the API section. You can create user-specific API keys or all-users API keys. Once you have obtained the API Key, set it along with the Domain and Username in the ProfileSettings connection property.

   Example Connection string

   Profile=C:\profiles\Discourse.apip;ProfileSettings='Domain=forum.example.com;APIKey=your_api_key;Username=your_username;'AuthScheme=APIKey;
   

   Built-in Connection String Designer

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

   java -jar cdata.jdbc.api.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 connection string is below:

   jdbc:api:Profile=C:\profiles\Discourse.apip;ProfileSettings='Domain=forum.example.com;APIKey=your_api_key;Username=your_username;'AuthScheme=APIKey;

Browse Discourse Tables

After you have added the driver JAR to the classpath and created a JDBC connection, you can now access Discourse entities in Informatica. Follow the steps below to connect to Discourse and browse Discourse tables:

1. Connect to your repository.
2. In the Connection Explorer, right-click the connection and click Connect.
3. Clear the Show Default Schema Only option. 👁 The driver models Discourse entities as relational tables. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

You can now browse Discourse tables in the Data Viewer: Right-click the node for the table and then click Open. On the Data Viewer view, click Run.

Create Discourse Data Objects

Follow the steps below to add Discourse tables to your project:

1. Select tables in Discourse, then right-click a table in Discourse, and click Add to Project.
2. In the resulting dialog, select the option to create a data object for each resource.
3. In the Select Location dialog, select your project.

   Create a Mapping

   Follow the steps below to add the Discourse source to a mapping:

   1. In the Object Explorer, right-click your project and then click New -> Mapping.
   2. Expand the node for the Discourse connection and then drag the data object for the table onto the editor.
   3. In the dialog that appears, select the Read option.
   👁 The source Discourse table in the mapping. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

   Follow the steps below to map Discourse columns to a flat file:

   1. In the Object Explorer, right-click your project and then click New -> Data Object.
   2. Select Flat File Data Object -> Create as Empty -> Fixed Width.
   3. In the properties for the Discourse object, select the rows you want, right-click, and then click copy. Paste the rows into the flat file properties.
   4. Drag the flat file data object onto the mapping. In the dialog that appears, select the Write option.
   5. Click and drag to connect columns.

   To transfer Discourse data, right-click in the workspace and then click Run Mapping.

   👁 The completed mapping. (Salesforce is shown.)