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The Slack ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from Slack, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.

Access Slack data like you would a database - read, write, and update Slack User, Channels, Messages, Files, etc. through a standard ODBC Driver interface.

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Build a Simple VCL Application for Slack Data


How to build a simple VCL Application to view Slack data in RAD Studio using the CData ODBC Driver for Slack.

Embarcadero RAD Studio provides a development environment for Delphi and C++Builder applications. With the CData ODBC Driver for Slack, you gain access to live Slack data within RAD Studio, abstracting the data into tables, views, and stored procedures that can be used to retrieve and update Slack data. This article will walk through connecting to Slack and creating a simple VCL application with the Form Designer.

Create a Connection to Slack Data

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.

Slack uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate using OAuth, you will need to create an app to obtain the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties. See the Getting Started section of the help documentation for an authentication guide.

You can then follow the steps below to use the Data Explorer to create a FireDAC connection to Slack data.

  1. In a new VCL Forms application, expand the FireDAC node in the Data Explorer.
  2. Right-click the ODBC Data Source node in the Data Explorer.
  3. Click Add New Connection.
  4. Enter a name for the connection.
  5. In the FireDAC Connection Editor that appears, set the DataSource property to the name of the ODBC DSN for Slack.

Create VCL Applications with Connectivity to Slack Data

Follow the procedure below to start executing queries to Slack data from a simple VCL application that displays the results of a query in a grid.

  1. Drop a TFDConnection component onto the form and set the following properties:

    • ConnectionDefName: Select the FireDAC connection to Slack data.
    • Connected: Select True from the menu and, in the dialog that appears, enter your credentials.

  2. Drop a TFDQuery component onto the form and set the properties below:

    • Connection: Set this property to the TFDConnection component, if this component is not already specified.

    • SQL: Click the button in the SQL property and enter a query. For example:

      SELECT Id, Name FROM Channels
    • Active: Set this property to true.

  3. Drop a TDataSource component onto the form and set the following property:

    • DataSet: In the menu for this property, select the name of the TFDQuery component.

  4. Drop a TDBGrid control onto the form and set the following property:

    • DataSource: Select the name of the TDataSource.
  5. Drop a TFDGUIxWaitCursor onto the form — this is required to avoid a run-time error.

You now have an executable application that displays the results of the SQL Query set in the TFDQuery object.