Manage REST Data in DBArtisan as a JDBC Source

The CData JDBC Driver for REST seamlessly integrates REST data into database management tools like DBArtisan by enabling you to access REST data as a database. This article shows how to create a JDBC source for REST in DBArtisan. You can then edit data visually and execute standard SQL.

Integrate REST Data into DBArtisan Projects

Follow the steps below to register REST data as a database instance in your project:

1. In DBArtisan, click Data Source -> Register Datasource.
2. Select Generic JDBC.
3. Click Manage.
4. In the resulting dialog, click New. Enter a name for the driver and click Add. In the resulting dialog, navigate to the driver JAR. The driver JAR is located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory. 👁 The JDBC driver definition in the Register Datasource wizard. (Salesforce is shown.)
   
5. In the Connection URL box, enter credentials and other required connection properties in the JDBC URL.

   See the Getting Started chapter in the data provider documentation to authenticate to your data source: The data provider models REST APIs as bidirectional database tables and XML/JSON files as read-only views (local files, files stored on popular cloud services, and FTP servers). The major authentication schemes are supported, including HTTP Basic, Digest, NTLM, OAuth, and FTP. See the Getting Started chapter in the data provider documentation for authentication guides.

   After setting the and providing any authentication values, set to "XML" or "JSON" and set to more closely match the data representation to the structure of your data.

   The property is the controlling property over how your data is represented into tables and toggles the following basic configurations.

   • Document (default): Model a top-level, document view of your REST data. The data provider returns nested elements as aggregates of data.
   • FlattenedDocuments: Implicitly join nested documents and their parents into a single table.
   • Relational: Return individual, related tables from hierarchical data. The tables contain a primary key and a foreign key that links to the parent document.

   See the Modeling REST Data chapter for more information on configuring the relational representation. You will also find the sample data used in the following examples. The data includes entries for people, the cars they own, and various maintenance services performed on those cars.

   Built-in Connection String Designer

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

   java -jar cdata.jdbc.rest.jar
   

   Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

   👁 Required JDBC connection properties in the Register Datasource wizard. (Salesforce is shown.)
   

   Below is a typical connection string:

   jdbc:rest:DataModel=Relational;URI=C:/people.xml;Format=XML;

6. Finish the wizard to connect to REST data. REST entities are displayed in the Datasource Explorer.

You can now work with REST data as you work with any other database. See the driver help documentation for more information on the queries supported by the REST API.