Connect to Salesforce Data from PowerBuilder via ADO.NET

This article demonstrates using the CData ADO.NET Provider for Salesforce in PowerBuilder, showcasing the ease of use and compatibility of these standards-based controls across various platforms and development technologies that support Microsoft .NET, including Appeon PowerBuilder.

This article shows how to create a basic PowerBuilder application that uses the CData ADO.NET Provider for Salesforce to perform reads and writes.

Getting Started

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1. In a new WPF Window Application solution, add all the Visual Controls needed for the connection properties. Below is a typical connection string:

   InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH;MFACode=YourMFACode

   There are several authentication methods available for connecting to Salesforce: OAuth, Login (or basic), and SSO. The Login method requires you to have the username, password, and security token of the user.

   OAuth Authentication (default)

   The default authentication mechanism (and the one preferred by Salesforce) is OAuth. To use OAuth with CData's embedded OAuth application, leave the connection properties blank. If you have configured your own custom OAuth application with Salesforce (see the Help documentation for more information), set OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL to the properties for you application. Set InitiateOAuth to the desired OAuth flow ("GETANDREFRESH" will have the connector manage the entire OAuth flow).

   Login (or Basic) Authentication

   If you do not wish do not wish to use OAuth authentication, you can use Login (or basic) authentication. Set AuthScheme to Basic, and set the User, Password, and SecurityToken properties. You can configure your security token in Salesforce.

   SSO (single sign-on) Authentication

   SSO (single sign-on) can be used by setting the SSOProperties, SSOLoginUrl, and SSOExchangeURL connection properties, which allow you to authenticate to an identity provider. See the "Getting Started" chapter in the Help documentation for more information.

   Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)

   If your Salesforce org has MFA enforcement enabled, set MFACode to the time-based one-time passcode (TOTP) generated by your authenticator app (such as Salesforce Authenticator or Google Authenticator). MFACode applies to both OAuth and Login authentication flows.

2. Add the DataGrid control from the .NET controls.
3. Configure the columns of the DataGrid control. Below are several columns from the Account table:

   <DataGrid AutoGenerateColumns="False" Margin="13,249,12,14" Name="datagrid1" TabIndex="70" ItemsSource="{Binding}">
   <DataGrid.Columns>
    <DataGridTextColumn x:Name="idColumn" Binding="{Binding Path=Id}" Header="Id" Width="SizeToHeader" />
    <DataGridTextColumn x:Name="nameColumn" Binding="{Binding Path=Industry}" Header="Industry" Width="SizeToHeader" />
   		...
   	</DataGrid.Columns>
   </DataGrid>
   

4. Add a reference to the CData ADO.NET Provider for Salesforce assembly.

Connect the DataGrid

Once the visual elements have been configured, you can use standard ADO.NET objects like Connection, Command, and DataAdapter to populate a DataTable with the results of an SQL query:

System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceConnection conn 
conn = create System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceConnection(connectionString)

System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceCommand comm 
comm = create System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceCommand(command, conn)

System.Data.DataTable table
table = create System.Data.DataTable

System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceDataAdapter dataAdapter
dataAdapter = create System.Data.CData.Salesforce.SalesforceDataAdapter(comm)
dataAdapter.Fill(table)	
datagrid1.ItemsSource=table.DefaultView

The code above can be used to bind data from the specified query to the DataGrid.