Query Google Search Results through ODBC in Node.js

Node.js is a JavaScript runtime environment that allows you to run JavaScript code outside of a browser. With the CData ODBC Driver for Google Search, you can access live Google Search results from Node.js apps and scripts. In this article, we walk through installing node-odbc and the required tools to create a simple Node.js app with access to live Google Search results.

With built-in optimized data processing, the CData ODBC Driver offers unmatched performance for interacting with live Google Search results in Node.js. When you issue complex SQL queries from Node.js to Google Search, the driver pushes supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Google Search and utilizes the embedded SQL engine to process unsupported operations client-side (often SQL functions and JOIN operations).

Connecting to Google Search Results

If you have not already done so, provide values for the required connection properties in the data source name (DSN). You can use the built-in Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to configure the DSN. This is also the last step of the driver installation. See the "Getting Started" chapter in the help documentation for a guide to using the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure a DSN.

To search with a Google custom search engine, you need to set the CustomSearchId and ApiKey connection properties.

To obtain the CustomSearchId property, sign into Google Custom Search Engine and create a new search engine.

To obtain the ApiKey property, you must enable the Custom Search API in the Google API Console.

Building node-odbc

In order to connect to Google Search through the CData ODBC Driver, you need to build node-odbc manually (after installing the required tools).

Installing the Required Tools

The following commands install the tools required to build node-odbc (note the -g parameter, which installs the tools globally).

npm i -g windows-build-tools
npm i -g node-gyp

Building node-odbc

After installing the required tools, create a directory for the Node.js app and install odbc (which builds the binary for us to use in our Node.js script).

mkdir nodeodbc
cd nodeodbc
npm i -g node

Querying Google Search from Node.js

With the ODBC Driver installed, a DSN Configured, and node-odbc built, we are ready to query live Google Search results from a Node.js app. The sample code below connects to a specific DSN and queries the VideoSearch table.

myscript.js

const odbc = require('odbc');

async function queryGoogleSearch() {
    const connection = await odbc.connect(`DSN=CData GoogleSearch Source`);
    const data = await connection.query('SELECT Title, ViewCount FROM VideoSearch');
    console.log(data);
}

queryGoogleSearch();

Once you write the app, use node to execute the script:

node myscript.js

Download a free, 30-day trial of the CData ODBC Driver for Google Search and start working with your live Google Search results in Node.js. Reach out to our Support Team if you have any questions.