Integrate with Dynamics 365 Data in JReport Designer



Create charts and reports based on Dynamics 365 data in JReport Designer.

The CData JDBC Driver for Dynamics 365 data enables access to live data from dashboards and reports as if Dynamics 365 were a relational database, allowing you to query Dynamics 365 data using familiar SQL queries. This article shows how to connect to Dynamics 365 data as a JDBC data source and create reports based on Dynamics 365 data in JReport Designer.

About Dynamics 365 Data Integration

CData simplifies access and integration of live Microsoft Dynamics 365 data. Our customers leverage CData connectivity to:

  • Read and write data in the full Dynamics 365 ecosystem: Sales, Customer Service, Finance & Operations, Marketing, and more.
  • Extend the native features of Dynamics CRM with customizable caching and intelligent query aggregation and separation.
  • Authenticate securely with Dynamics 365 in a variety of ways, including Azure Active Directory, Azure Managed Service Identity credentials, and Azure Service Principal using either a client secret or a certificate.
  • Use SQL stored procedures to manage their Dynamics 365 entities - listing, creating, and removing associations between entities.

CData customers use our Dynamics 365 connectivity solutions for a variety of reasons, whether they're looking to replicate their data into a data warehouse (alongside other data sources)or analyze live Dynamics 365 data from their preferred data tools inside the Microsoft ecosystem (Power BI, Excel, etc.) or with external tools (Tableau, Looker, etc.).


Getting Started


Connect to Dynamics 365 Data

  1. Edit C:\JReport\Designer\bin\setenv.bat to add the location of the JAR file to the ADDCLASSPATH variable:
    ...
    set ADDCLASSPATH=%JAVAHOME%\lib\tools.jar;C:\Program Files\CData\CData JDBC Driver for Dynamics 365 2016\lib\cdata.jdbc.dynamics365.jar;
    ...
    
  2. Create a new data source by clicking File New Data Source.
  3. In the resulting dialog, create a name for the data source (CData JDBC Driver for Dynamics 365), select JDBC, and click OK.
  4. In the Get JDBC Connection Information dialog you will configure your connection to the JDBC driver:
    • Driver: Be sure that the Driver box is checked and fill in the name of the class for the driver: cdata.jdbc.dynamics365.Dynamics365Driver
    • URL: Enter the JDBC URL. This starts with jdbc:dynamics365: and is followed by a semicolon-separated list of connection properties.

      Edition and OrganizationUrl are required connection properties. The Dynamics 365 connector supports connecting to the following editions: CustomerService, FieldService, FinOpsOnline, FinOpsOnPremise, HumanResources, Marketing, ProjectOperations and Sales.

      For Dynamics 365 Business Central, use the separate Dynamics 365 Business Central driver.

      OrganizationUrl is the URL to your Dynamics 365 organization. For instance, https://orgcb42e1d0.crm.dynamics.com

      Built-in Connection String Designer

      For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the Dynamics 365 JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

      java -jar cdata.jdbc.dynamics365.jar

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

      When you configure the JDBC URL, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

      Below is a typical JDBC URL:

      jdbc:dynamics365:OrganizationUrl=https://myaccount.operations.dynamics.com/;Edition=Sales;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH
    • User: The username to authenticate with; typically left blank.
    • Password: The password to authenticate with; typically left blank.
  5. In the Add Table dialog, select the tables you wish to include in your report (or in future reports using this data source) and click Add.

    Click Done once the dialog has completed loading the tables.

  6. In the Catalog Browser, you can create the queries that you will use to populate your reports. You can do this now, or after you create your report. In either case, expand () the data source (CData JDBC Driver for Dynamics 365), right-click on Queries, and select Add Query.
  7. In the Add Table/View/Query dialog, expand () the JDBC URL and Tables and select the table(s) you wish to use in the query and click OK.
  8. In the Query Editor dialog, you can select the columns you wish to include or simply click the SQL button and manually input your own query. For example:
    SELECT GoalHeadingId, Name FROM GoalHeadings WHERE Name = 'MyAccount'
    

    With the query built, click OK to close the Query Editor dialog. At this point you are ready to add Dynamics 365 data to a new or existing report.

    NOTE: Now that the query is built, you can create a Business View based on the query. With a Business View, you can create Web reports or library components based on the query. For more information on this, refer to the JReport tutorials.

Add Dynamics 365 Data to a Report

You are now ready to create a report with Dynamics 365 data.

  1. Create a new report (File New Page Report) or open the Chart Wizard for an existing report.
  2. Select the Query (or create a new one; see above).
  3. Assign a Category and Value for the chart from the columns in your Query and click Finish.
  4. Click the View tab for your report to see the chart.

Ready to get started?

Download a free trial of the Dynamics 365 Driver to get started:

 Download Now

Learn more:

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