Integrate with Dropbox Data in JReport Designer

The CData JDBC Driver for Dropbox data enables access to live data from dashboards and reports as if Dropbox were a relational database, allowing you to query Dropbox data using familiar SQL queries. This article shows how to connect to Dropbox data as a JDBC data source and create reports based on Dropbox data in JReport Designer.

Connect to Dropbox Data

1. Edit C:\JReport\Designer\bin\setenv.bat to add the location of the JAR file to the ADDCLASSPATH variable:

   ...
   set ADDCLASSPATH=%JAVAHOME%\lib\tools.jar;C:\Program Files\CData\CData JDBC Driver for Dropbox 2016\lib\cdata.jdbc.dropbox.jar;
   ...
   

2. Create a new data source by clicking File New Data Source.
3. In the resulting dialog, create a name for the data source (CData JDBC Driver for Dropbox), select JDBC, and click OK.
4. In the Get JDBC Connection Information dialog you will configure your connection to the JDBC driver:
   • Driver: Be sure that the Driver box is checked and fill in the name of the class for the driver:

     cdata.jdbc.dropbox.DropboxDriver

   • URL: Enter the JDBC URL. This starts with jdbc:dropbox: and is followed by a semicolon-separated list of connection properties.

     Dropbox uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate using OAuth, you can use the embedded credentials or register an app with Dropbox.

     See the Getting Started guide in the CData driver documentation for more information.

     Built-in Connection String Designer

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

     java -jar cdata.jdbc.dropbox.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.)
     

     When you configure the JDBC URL, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

     Below is a typical JDBC URL:

     jdbc:dropbox:InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;

   • User: The username to authenticate with; typically left blank.
   • Password: The password to authenticate with; typically left blank.
   👁 Configuring the connection to the JDBC Driver (Salesforce is shown.)
   

5. In the Add Table dialog, select the tables you wish to include in your report (or in future reports using this data source) and click Add.

   👁 Adding Tables. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

   Click Done once the dialog has completed loading the tables.

6. In the Catalog Browser, you can create the queries that you will use to populate your reports. You can do this now, or after you create your report. In either case, expand () the data source (CData JDBC Driver for Dropbox), right-click on Queries, and select Add Query. 👁 Adding a query for data to be used in the report. (Salesforce is shown.)
   
7. In the Add Table/View/Query dialog, expand () the JDBC URL and Tables and select the table(s) you wish to use in the query and click OK. 👁 Selecting a table for the query. (Salesforce is shown.)
   
8. In the Query Editor dialog, you can select the columns you wish to include or simply click the SQL button and manually input your own query. For example:

   SELECT Id, Name FROM Files
   

   👁 Editing the query. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

   With the query built, click OK to close the Query Editor dialog. At this point you are ready to add Dropbox data to a new or existing report.

   NOTE: Now that the query is built, you can create a Business View based on the query. With a Business View, you can create Web reports or library components based on the query. For more information on this, refer to the JReport tutorials.

Add Dropbox Data to a Report

You are now ready to create a report with Dropbox data.

1. Create a new report (File New Page Report) or open the Chart Wizard for an existing report.
2. Select the Query (or create a new one; see above).
👁 Selecting the query to use. (Salesforce is shown.)

3. Assign a Category and Value for the chart from the columns in your Query and click Finish.
👁 Assigning columns to define the chart. (Salesforce is shown.)

4. Click the View tab for your report to see the chart.