Visualize Live eBay Data in Power BI (via CData Connect AI)

Power BI transforms your company's data into rich visuals for you to collect and organize so you can focus on what matters to you. When paired with CData Connect AI, you get access to eBay data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to use CData Connect to create a live connection to eBay, connect to eBay data from Power BI and then create reports on eBay data in Power BI.

Configure eBay Connectivity for Power BI

Connectivity to eBay from Power BI is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with eBay data from Power BI, we start by creating and configuring a eBay connection.

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection
👁 Adding a Connection

2. Select "eBay" from the Add Connection panel
👁 Selecting a data source

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to eBay.

   If you will be accessing your own account, you can generate an OAuthAccessToken from your developer account dashboard. You can also allow other users to securely access their own accounts.

   Both of these methods require you to create an application key set to obtain values for the following connection properties: AppId, CertId, DevId, and SiteId.

   The user consent flow additionally requires the RuName and CallbackURL.

   See the "Getting Started" chapter in the help documentation for a guide to using OAuth.

   👁 Configuring a connection (Salesforce is shown)
   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add eBay Connection page and update the User-based permissions. 👁 Updating permissions
   

With the connection configured, you are ready to connect to eBay data from Power BI.

Query eBay Tables

Follow the steps below to build a query to pull eBay data into the report:

1. Open Power BI Desktop and click Get Data -> Online Services -> CData Connect AI and click "Connect"
2. Click "Sign in" and authenticate with your CData Connect AI account 👁 Authenticating with Connect AI
   
3. After signing in, click "Connect" 👁 Connecting to Connect AI
   
4. Select tables in the Navigator dialog 👁 The available tables. (Salesforce tables are shown)
   
5. Click Load to establish the connection to your eBay data from Power BI

Create eBay Data Visualizations

After connecting to the data into Power BI, you can create data visualizations in the Report view by dragging fields from the Fields pane onto the canvas. Select the dimensions and measures you wish to visualize along with the chart type.

Click Refresh to synchronize your report with any changes to the data.

Live Access to eBay Data from Data Applications

With CData Connect AI you have a direct connection to eBay data from Power BI. You can import more data, create new visualizations, build reports, and more — all without replicating eBay data.

To get SQL data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources (including eBay) directly from your on-premise BI, reporting, ETL and other data applications, visit the CData Connect AI page and start a free trial.