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URL: https://www.cdata.com/kb/tech/dynamics365-excel-cdataquery.rst

⇱ Excel Spreadsheet Automation on Dynamics 365 Data with the QUERY Formula

Excel Spreadsheet Automation on Dynamics 365 Data with the QUERY Formula

👁 Jerod Johnson
Jerod Johnson
Director, Technology Evangelism
Pull data from Dynamics 365, automate spreadsheets, and more with the QUERY formula.

The CData Excel Add-In for Dynamics 365 provides formulas that can edit, save, and delete Dynamics 365 data. The following three steps show how you can automate the following task: Search Dynamics 365 data for a user-specified value and then organize the results into an Excel spreadsheet.

About Dynamics 365 Data Integration

CData simplifies access and integration of live Microsoft Dynamics 365 data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:

  • Read and write data in the full Dynamics 365 ecosystem: Sales, Customer Service, Finance & Operations, Marketing, and more.
  • Extend the native features of Dynamics CRM with customizable caching and intelligent query aggregation and separation.
  • Authenticate securely with Dynamics 365 in a variety of ways, including Azure Active Directory, Azure Managed Service Identity credentials, and Azure Service Principal using either a client secret or a certificate.
  • Use SQL stored procedures to manage their Dynamics 365 entities - listing, creating, and removing associations between entities.

CData customers use our Dynamics 365 connectivity solutions for a variety of reasons, whether they're looking to replicate their data into a data warehouse (alongside other data sources) or analyze live Dynamics 365 data from their preferred data tools inside the Microsoft ecosystem (Power BI, Excel, etc.) or with external tools (Tableau, Looker, etc.).


Getting Started


The syntax of the CDATAQUERY formula is the following: 

=CDATAQUERY(Query, [Connection], [Parameters], [ResultLocation]);

This formula requires three inputs:

  • Query: The declaration of the Dynamics 365 data records you want to retrieve or the modifications to be made, written in standard SQL.

  • Connection: Either the connection name, such as Dynamics365Connection1, or a connection string. The connection string consists of the required properties for connecting to Dynamics 365 data, separated by semicolons.

    Edition and OrganizationUrl are required connection properties. The Dynamics 365 connector supports connecting to the following editions: CustomerService, FieldService, FinOpsOnline, FinOpsOnPremise, HumanResources, Marketing, ProjectOperations and Sales.

    For Dynamics 365 Business Central, use the separate Dynamics 365 Business Central driver.

    OrganizationUrl is the URL to your Dynamics 365 organization. For instance, https://orgcb42e1d0.crm.dynamics.com

  • ResultLocation: The cell that the output of results should start from.

Pass Spreadsheet Cells as Inputs to the Query

The procedure below results in a spreadsheet that organizes all the formula inputs in the first column.

  1. Define cells for the formula inputs. In addition to the connection inputs, add another input to define a criterion for a filter to be used to search Dynamics 365 data, such as Name.
  2. In another cell, write the formula, referencing the cell values from the user input cells defined above. Single quotes are used to enclose values such as addresses that may contain spaces.
    3. =CDATAQUERY("SELECT * FROM GoalHeadings WHERE Name = '"&B4&"'","OrganizationUrl="&B1&";Edition="&B2&";InitiateOAuth="&B3&";Provider=Dynamics365",B5)
    👁 Formula inputs used in this example. (Google Apps is shown.)
  3. Change the filter to change the data. 👁 The outputs of the formula. (Google Apps is shown.)

Ready to get started?

Download a free trial of the Excel Add-In for Dynamics 365 to get started:

 Download Now

Learn more:

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Excel Add-In for Dynamics 365

The Dynamics 365 Excel Add-In is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live Dynamics 365 data, directly from Microsoft Excel.

Use Excel to read, write, and update Dynamics 365 Leads, Contacts, Opportunities, Accounts, etc. Perfect for mass imports / exports / updates, data cleansing & de-duplication, Excel based data analysis, and more!