How to connect PolyBase to Zoho Inventory

PolyBase for SQL Server allows you to query external data by using the same Transact-SQL syntax used to query a database table. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for Zoho Inventory, you get access to your Zoho Inventory data directly alongside your SQL Server data. This article describes creating an external data source and external tables to grant access to live Zoho Inventory data using T-SQL queries.

NOTE: PolyBase is only available on SQL Server 19 and above.

The CData ODBC drivers offer unmatched performance for interacting with live Zoho Inventory data using PolyBase due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from SQL Server to Zoho Inventory, the driver pushes down supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Zoho Inventory and utilizes the embedded SQL engine to process unsupported operations (often SQL functions and JOIN operations) client-side. And with PolyBase, you can also join SQL Server data with Zoho Inventory data, using a single query to pull data from distributed sources.

Connect to Zoho Inventory

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs. To create an external data source in SQL Server using PolyBase, configure a System DSN (CData Zoho Inventory Sys is created automatically).

In order to connect to Zoho Inventory, set the following connection properties:

• OrganizationId: set this to the ID associated with your specific Zoho Inventory organization
• InitiateOAuth: set the to "GETANDREFRESH"
• AccountsServer (Optional): set this full Account Server URL (only when manually refreshing the OAuth token)

The connectors use OAuth to authenticate with Zoho Inventory. For more information, refer to the Getting Started section of the Help documentation.

Click "Test Connection" to ensure that the DSN is connected to Zoho Inventory properly. Navigate to the Tables tab to review the table definitions for Zoho Inventory.

Create an External Data Source for Zoho Inventory Data

After configuring the connection, you need to create a master encryption key and a credential database for the external data source.

Creating a Master Encryption Key

Execute the following SQL command to create a new master key, 'ENCRYPTION,' to encrypt the credentials for the external data source.

CREATE MASTER KEY ENCRYPTION BY PASSWORD = 'password';

Creating a Credential Database

Execute the following SQL command to create credentials for the external data source connected to Zoho Inventory data.

NOTE: Since Zoho Inventory does not require a User or Password to authenticate, you may use whatever values you wish for IDENTITY and SECRET.

CREATE DATABASE SCOPED CREDENTIAL zohoinventory_creds
WITH IDENTITY = 'username', SECRET = 'password';

Create an External Data Source for Zoho Inventory

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE SQL command to create an external data source for Zoho Inventory with PolyBase:

• Set the LOCATION parameter , using the DSN and credentials configured earlier.

PUSHDOWN is set to ON by default, meaning the ODBC Driver can leverage server-side processing for complex queries.

CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE cdata_zohoinventory_source
WITH ( 
 LOCATION = 'odbc://SERVER_URL',
 CONNECTION_OPTIONS = 'DSN=CData Zoho Inventory Sys',
 -- PUSHDOWN = ON | OFF,
 CREDENTIAL = zohoinventory_creds
);

Create External Tables for Zoho Inventory

After creating the external data source, use CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE statements to link to Zoho Inventory data from your SQL Server instance. The table column definitions must match those exposed by the CData ODBC Driver for Zoho Inventory. You can refer to the Tables tab of the DSN Configuration Wizard to see the table definition.

👁 Table definition in the DSN Configuration Wizard (Salesforce is shown)

Sample CREATE TABLE Statement

The statement to create an external table based on a Zoho Inventory Contacts would look similar to the following:

CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE Contacts(
 Id [nvarchar](255) NULL,
 CustomerName [nvarchar](255) NULL,
 ...
) WITH ( 
 LOCATION='Contacts',
 DATA_SOURCE=cdata_zohoinventory_source
);

Having created external tables for Zoho Inventory in your SQL Server instance, you are now able to query local and remote data simultaneously. Thanks to built-in query processing in the CData ODBC Driver, you know that as much query processing as possible is being pushed to Zoho Inventory, freeing up local resources and computing power. Download a free, 30-day trial of the ODBC Driver for Zoho Inventory and start working with live Zoho Inventory data alongside your SQL Server data today.