Connect to HCL Domino Data from Crystal Reports

Crystal Reports is a business intelligence application by SAP designed to help you analyze your data with well-formatted, pixel-perfect, and multi-page reports. When paired with CData Connect Cloud, Crystal Reports gets access to live HCL Domino data. This article demonstrates how to connect to HCL Domino using Connect Cloud and report on HCL Domino data in Crystal Reports.

CData Connect Cloud provides a pure SQL Server interface for HCL Domino, allowing you to query data from HCL Domino without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Cloud pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to HCL Domino, leveraging server-side processing to return the requested HCL Domino data quickly.

Configure HCL Domino Connectivity for Crystal Reports

Connectivity to HCL Domino from Crystal Reports is made possible through CData Connect Cloud. To work with HCL Domino data from Crystal Reports, we start by creating and configuring a HCL Domino connection.

1. Log into Connect Cloud, click Connections and click Add Connection
2. Select "HCL Domino" from the Add Connection panel
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to HCL Domino.

   Connecting to Domino

   To connect to Domino data, set the following properties:

   • URL: The host name or IP of the server hosting the Domino database. Include the port of the server hosting the Domino database. For example: http://sampleserver:1234/
   • DatabaseScope: The name of a scope in the Domino Web UI. The driver exposes forms and views for the schema governed by the specified scope. In the Domino Admin UI, select the Scopes menu in the sidebar. Set this property to the name of an existing scope.

   Authenticating with Domino

   Domino supports authenticating via login credentials or an Azure Active Directory OAuth application:

   Login Credentials

   To authenticate with login credentials, set the following properties:

   • AuthScheme: Set this to "OAuthPassword"
   • User: The username of the authenticating Domino user
   • Password: The password associated with the authenticating Domino user

   The driver uses the login credentials to automatically perform an OAuth token exchange.

   AzureAD

   This authentication method uses Azure Active Directory as an IdP to obtain a JWT token. You need to create a custom OAuth application in Azure Active Directory and configure it as an IdP. To do so, follow the instructions in the Help documentation. Then set the following properties:

   • AuthScheme: Set this to "AzureAD"
   • InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH. You can use InitiateOAuth to avoid repeating the OAuth exchange and manually setting the OAuthAccessToken.
   • OAuthClientId: The Client ID obtained when setting up the custom OAuth application.
   • OAuthClientSecret: The Client secret obtained when setting up the custom OAuth application.
   • CallbackURL: The redirect URI defined when you registered your app. For example: https://localhost:33333
   • AzureTenant: The Microsoft Online tenant being used to access data. Supply either a value in the form companyname.microsoft.com or the tenant ID.

     The tenant ID is the same as the directory ID shown in the Azure Portal's Azure Active Directory > Properties page.

4. Click Create & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add HCL Domino Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

If you are connecting from a service, application, platform, or framework that does not support OAuth authentication, you can create a Personal Access Token (PAT) to use for authentication. Best practices would dictate that you create a separate PAT for each service, to maintain granularity of access.

1. Click on your username at the top right of the Connect Cloud app and click User Profile.
2. On the User Profile page, scroll down to the Personal Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
3. Give your PAT a name and click Create.
4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

Connect to HCL Domino from Crystal Reports using Connect Cloud

To establish a connection from Crystal Reports to CData Connect Cloud, you will need to download the JDBC Driver.

1. Open the Client Tools page of CData Connect Cloud.
2. In the Dev Tools section, click JDBC.
3. Download and run the setup file.
4. When the installation is complete, locate the JDBC Connect JAR file in the JDBC driver's installation directory, for example, C:\Program Files\CData\JDBC Driver for CData Connect\lib.
5. Copy the JDBC Connect JAR file (cdata.jdbc.connect.jar).

After copying the JDBC CData Connect JAR file, you will need to paste it into the Crystal Reports installation location and configure the connection to Connect Cloud.

1. Find the installation directory for Crystal Reports, for example, C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\java\lib
2. Paste the JDBC Connect JAR file into the Crystal Reports installation directory.
3. Go to the parent java folder. For example, C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\java This folder should contain a CRConfig file.
4. Open CRConfig in a text editor.
5. Add the path to the JDBC CData Connect JAR file in the of the CRConfig file, for example, C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\java\lib
6. Log into Crystal Reports and start a blank report.
7. In the Database Expert dialog, click Create New Connection.
8. Select the JDBC data source and the tables you want to add. Click OK.
9. In the Connection dialog, enter the Connection URL (e.g. jdbc:connect:AuthScheme=OAuth;) and Database Classname (e.g. cdata.jdbc.connect.ConnectDriver).
10. Click Finish. The Database Expert dialog displays all available connections.

You can now create reports with the connected data.

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