How to connect PolyBase to Reckon Accounts Hosted

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 Reckon Accounts Hosted, you get access to your Reckon Accounts Hosted data directly alongside your SQL Server data. This article describes creating an external data source and external tables to grant access to live Reckon Accounts Hosted data using T-SQL queries.

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

The CData ODBC drivers offer unmatched performance for interacting with live Reckon Accounts Hosted data using PolyBase due to optimized data processing built into the driver. When you issue complex SQL queries from SQL Server to Reckon Accounts Hosted, the driver pushes down supported SQL operations, like filters and aggregations, directly to Reckon Accounts Hosted 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 Reckon Accounts Hosted data, using a single query to pull data from distributed sources.

Connect to Reckon Accounts Hosted

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 Reckon Accounts Hosted Sys is created automatically).

The connector makes requests to Reckon Accounts Hosted through OAuth. Specify the following connection properties:

• SubscriptionKey: Required. You get this value when you created your developer account.
• CountryVersion: Defaults to 2021.R2.AU.
• CompanyFile: Required. The path to the company file.
• User: Required. The username of the company file.
• Password: Required. The password of the company file.
• InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH to let the driver handle access tokens.
• CallbackURL: The redirectURI of your Custom OAuth App.
• OAuthClientId: The client id of your Custom OAuth App.
• OAuthClientSecret: The client secret of your Custom OAuth App.

CData provides an embedded OAuth application that simplifies OAuth desktop authentication. See the Help documentation for information on other OAuth authentication methods (web, headless, etc.), creating custom OAuth applications, and reasons for doing so.

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

Create an External Data Source for Reckon Accounts Hosted 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 Reckon Accounts Hosted data.

NOTE: IDENTITY and SECRET correspond with the User and Password properties for Reckon Accounts Hosted.

CREATE DATABASE SCOPED CREDENTIAL reckonaccountshosted_creds
WITH IDENTITY = 'reckonaccountshosted_username', SECRET = 'reckonaccountshosted_password';

Create an External Data Source for Reckon Accounts Hosted

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE SQL command to create an external data source for Reckon Accounts Hosted with PolyBase:

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

For Reckon Accounts Hosted, set SERVERNAME to the URL or address for your server (e.g. 'localhost' or '127.0.0.1' for local servers; the remote URL for remote servers). Leave PORT empty. PUSHDOWN is set to ON by default, meaning the ODBC Driver can leverage server-side processing for complex queries.

CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE cdata_reckonaccountshosted_source
WITH ( 
  LOCATION = 'odbc://SERVER_URL',
  CONNECTION_OPTIONS = 'DSN=CData Reckon Accounts Hosted Sys',
  -- PUSHDOWN = ON | OFF,
  CREDENTIAL = reckonaccountshosted_creds
);

Create External Tables for Reckon Accounts Hosted

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

Sample CREATE TABLE Statement

The statement to create an external table based on a Reckon Accounts Hosted Accounts would look similar to the following:

CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE Accounts(
  Name [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  Balance [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  ...
) WITH ( 
  LOCATION='Accounts',
  DATA_SOURCE=cdata_reckonaccountshosted_source
);

Having created external tables for Reckon Accounts Hosted 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 Reckon Accounts Hosted, freeing up local resources and computing power. Download a free, 30-day trial of the ODBC Driver for Reckon Accounts Hosted and start working with live Reckon Accounts Hosted data alongside your SQL Server data today.