Visualize Live Exact Online 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 Exact Online data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to use CData Connect to create a live connection to Exact Online, connect to Exact Online data from Power BI and then create reports on Exact Online data in Power BI.

Configure Exact Online Connectivity for Power BI

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

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

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

3. Exact Online uses OAuth to authenticate. Click "Sign in" to authenticate with Exact Online. 👁 Authenticating with OAuth (Salesforce is shown).
   
4. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add Exact Online Connection page and update the User-based permissions. 👁 Updating permissions
   

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

Query Exact Online Tables

Follow the steps below to build a query to pull Exact Online 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 Exact Online data from Power BI

Create Exact Online 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 Exact Online Data from Data Applications

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

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