Analyze Sybase Data in R via JDBC

Access Sybase data with pure R script and standard SQL on any machine where R and Java can be installed. You can use the CData JDBC Driver for Sybase and the RJDBC package to work with remote Sybase data in R. By using the CData Driver, you are leveraging a driver written for industry-proven standards to access your data in the popular, open-source R language. This article shows how to use the driver to execute SQL queries to Sybase and visualize Sybase data by calling standard R functions.

Install R

You can match the driver's performance gains from multi-threading and managed code by running the multithreaded Microsoft R Open or by running open R linked with the BLAS/LAPACK libraries. This article uses Microsoft R Open 3.2.3, which is preconfigured to install packages from the Jan. 1, 2016 snapshot of the CRAN repository. This snapshot ensures reproducibility.

Load the RJDBC Package

To use the driver, download the RJDBC package. After installing the RJDBC package, the following line loads the package:

library(RJDBC)

Connect to Sybase as a JDBC Data Source

You will need the following information to connect to Sybase as a JDBC data source:

• Driver Class: Set this to cdata.jdbc.sybase.SybaseDriver
• Classpath: Set this to the location of the driver JAR. By default this is the lib subfolder of the installation folder.

The DBI functions, such as dbConnect and dbSendQuery, provide a unified interface for writing data access code in R. Use the following line to initialize a DBI driver that can make JDBC requests to the CData JDBC Driver for Sybase:

driver <- JDBC(driverClass = "cdata.jdbc.sybase.SybaseDriver", classPath = "MyInstallationDir\lib\cdata.jdbc.sybase.jar", identifier.quote = "'") 

You can now use DBI functions to connect to Sybase and execute SQL queries. Initialize the JDBC connection with the dbConnect function.

To connect to Sybase, specify the following connection properties:

• Server: Set this to the name or network address of the Sybase database instance.
• Database: Set this to the name of the Sybase database running on the specified Server.

Optionally, you can also secure your connections with TLS/SSL by setting UseSSL to true.

Sybase supports several methods for authentication including Password and Kerberos.

Connect Using Password Authentication

Set the AuthScheme to Password and set the following connection properties to use Sybase authentication.

• User: Set this to the username of the authenticating Sybase user.
• Password: Set this to the username of the authenticating Sybase user.

Connect using LDAP Authentication

To connect with LDAP authentication, configure Sybase server-side to use the LDAP authentication mechanism.

After configuring Sybase for LDAP, you can connect using the same credentials as Password authentication.

Connect Using Kerberos Authentication

To leverage Kerberos authentication, begin by enabling it setting AuthScheme to Kerberos. See the Using Kerberos section in the Help documentation for more information on using Kerberos authentication.

You can find an example connection string below:

Server=MyServer;Port=MyPort;User=SampleUser;Password=SamplePassword;Database=MyDB;Kerberos=true;KerberosKDC=MyKDC;KerberosRealm=MYREALM.COM;KerberosSPN=server-name

Built-in Connection String Designer

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

java -jar cdata.jdbc.sybase.jar

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

👁 Using the built-in connection string designer to generate a JDBC URL (Salesforce is shown.)

Below is a sample dbConnect call, including a typical JDBC connection string:

conn <- dbConnect(driver,"jdbc:sybase:User=myuser;Password=mypassword;Server=localhost;Database=mydatabase;Charset=iso_1;")

Schema Discovery

The driver models Sybase APIs as relational tables, views, and stored procedures. Use the following line to retrieve the list of tables:

dbListTables(conn)

Execute SQL Queries

You can use the dbGetQuery function to execute any SQL query supported by the Sybase API:

products <- dbGetQuery(conn,"SELECT Id, ProductName FROM Products WHERE ProductName = Konbu")

You can view the results in a data viewer window with the following command:

View(products)

Plot Sybase Data

You can now analyze Sybase data with any of the data visualization packages available in the CRAN repository. You can create simple bar plots with the built-in bar plot function:

par(las=2,ps=10,mar=c(5,15,4,2))
barplot(products$ProductName, main="Sybase Products", names.arg = products$Id, horiz=TRUE)

👁 A basic bar plot. (Salesforce is shown.)