How to create Visio diagrams from Twitter Data

Automate the process of entering data into Visio diagrams and keeping your diagrams up to date with the CData ODBC Driver for Twitter. The driver surfaces Twitter data as an ODBC data source that can be accessed by applications with built-in ODBC support like Microsoft Office. This article shows how to create a simple diagram to start brainstorming about Visio projects linked to Twitter data.

Connect to Twitter as an ODBC Data Source

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.

All tables require authentication. You can connect using your User and Password or OAuth. To authenticate using OAuth, you can use the embedded OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL or you can register an app to obtain your own.

If you intend to communicate with Twitter only as the currently authenticated user, then you can obtain the OAuthAccessToken and OAuthAccessTokenSecret directly by registering an app.

See the Getting Started chapter in the help documentation for a guide to using OAuth.

Connect Twitter Data to Diagrams

Follow the steps below to use the Data Selector Wizard to import data into your diagram.

1. Open Visio and click File -> New. Open the Brainstorming template.
2. On the Data tab, click Link Data to Shapes.
3. Select the ODBC option and select ODBC DSN.
4. Select the DSN for Twitter, select the table you want to import, and finish the wizard. This article uses Tweets as an example.

Link Twitter Entities to Shapes

Follow the steps below to create a simple diagram that shows how to create shapes from your data, one of the ways to link Twitter entities to shapes:

1. Click Brainstorming Shapes and drag a main topic onto the drawing page. Enter Tweets as the text of the main topic.
2. Click Topic.
3. Select a row in the External Data window and drag it onto the drawing page.
4. Right-click the Topic shape and click Data -> Edit Data Graphic.
5. Click New Item.
6. In the Data Field menu, select a column. In the Displayed As menu, select how to display them.
7. Drag a few other Twitter entities onto the drawing page and add association lines back to the main topic, Tweets. New topics have the same configuration: Numeric columns displayed in data bars stand out in contrast to other Tweets entities.

You can refresh your diagram from the Data tab, synchronizing your shapes with the external Twitter data.