USER MANUALS

Specifying Paths in Virtual DataPort

To create a DF, JSON or XML data source you have to specify a path to the data. The syntax to specify this path is common between these three data source types: DF, JSON, XML and Custom.

Syntax to set the path in a DF, JSON or XML data source
<route> ::=
    LOCAL { 'LocalConnection' | 'VariableConnection' } <path:literal>
        [ FILENAMEPATTERN = <literal> ]
        [ CHARSET = <encoding:literal> ]
  | HTTP
      {
          'http.CommonsHttpClientConnection [ <option> {, <option> }* } ]'
        | 'http.DenodoBrowserPoolConnection [ <option> {, <option> }* } ]'
      }
      { GET | POST } <uri:literal>
      [ POSTBODY <body:literal> [ MIME <mimetype:literal> ] ]
      [ HEADERS (
          <header name:literal> = <header value:literal>
          [, <header name:literal> = <header value:literal> ]*
      ) ]
      [ CHECKCERTIFICATES ]
      [ <authentication> ]
      [ <proxy> ]
      [ CHARSET = <encoding:literal> ]
   | FTP 'ftp.FtpClientConnectionAdapter' <uri:literal> <login:literal>
     <password:literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
     [ FILENAMEPATTERN = <literal> ]
     [ CHARSET = <encoding:literal> ]
   }

<authentication> ::=
  AUTHENTICATION {
      OFF
    | BASIC ( <credentials> )
    | BASIC ( WITH PASS-THROUGH SESSION CREDENTIALS ( <credentials> ) )
    | DIGEST ( <credentials> )
    | DIGEST ( WITH PASS-THROUGH SESSION CREDENTIALS ( <credentials> ) )
    | NTLM ( <ntlm_credentials> )
    | NTLM ( WITH PASS-THROUGH SESSION CREDENTIALS ( <ntlm_credentials> ) )
    | OAUTH10A (
          CLIENTIDENTIFIER = <literal>
          CLIENTSHAREDSECRET = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
          [
              ACCESSTOKEN = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
              ACCESSTOKENSECRET = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
          ]
          SIGNATUREMETHOD = { HMAC_SHA1 | PLAINTEXT }
          [
              TEMPORARYCREDENTIALREQUESTURL = <literal> { GET | POST }
              RESOURCEOWNERAUTHORIZATIONURL = <literal>
              TOKENREQUESTURL = <literal> { GET | POST }
              REDIRECTURL = { OOB | DEFAULT | <literal> }
          ]
      )
    | OAUTH20 (
          ACCESSTOKEN = {
                <token:literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
              | VARIABLE <name of the variable:literal>
          }
          REQUESTSIGNINGMETHOD = {
                HEADER
              | FORM_ENCODED
              | URL [ <query parameter name:literal> ]
          }
          {
             AUTHENTICATION_GRANT = PASSWORD_GRANT (
                 USER_IDENTIFIER = <literal>
                 USER_PASSWORD = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
             )
             [ TOKENENDPOINTURL = <literal> ]
             [ EXTRA_PARAMETERS_OF_REFRESH_TOKEN_REQUEST (
                 <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal>
                 [ , <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal> ]+
               )
             ]
             CLIENTIDENTIFIER = <literal>
             CLIENTSECRET = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
             [ AUTHENTICATION_METHOD_OF_AUTHORIZATION_SERVERS =
                 { HTTP_BASIC | REQUEST_BODY } ]
             [ ACCESSTOKENEXPIRESIN =
                  <access token expires in # seconds:long> ]
             ]
          |
             AUTHENTICATION_GRANT = CLIENT_CREDENTIALS_GRANT
             [ TOKENENDPOINTURL = <literal> ]
             [ EXTRA_PARAMETERS_OF_REFRESH_TOKEN_REQUEST (
                 <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal>
                 [ , <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal> ]+
               )
             ]
             CLIENTIDENTIFIER = <literal>
             CLIENTSECRET = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
             [ AUTHENTICATION_METHOD_OF_AUTHORIZATION_SERVERS =
                 { HTTP_BASIC | REQUEST_BODY } ]
             [ ACCESSTOKENEXPIRESIN =
                 <access token expires in # seconds:long> ]
             ]
          |
             AUTHENTICATION_GRANT = CODE_GRANT
             [ TOKENENDPOINTURL = <literal> ]
             [ EXTRA_PARAMETERS_OF_REFRESH_TOKEN_REQUEST (
                 <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal>
                 [ , <parameter name:literal> = <parameter value:literal> ]+
               )
             ]
             CLIENTIDENTIFIER = <literal>
             CLIENTSECRET = <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
             [ AUTHENTICATION_METHOD_OF_AUTHORIZATION_SERVERS =
                 { HTTP_BASIC | REQUEST_BODY } ]
             [ REFRESHTOKEN = {
                   <token:literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]
                 | VARIABLE <name of the variable:literal>
               }
             ]
             [ ACCESSTOKENEXPIRESIN =
                 <access token expires in # seconds:long> ]
             ]
             [
                 AUTHORIZATIONSERVERURL = <literal>
                 [ REDIRECTIONENDPOINTURL { DEFAULT | <literal> } ]
                 [ SCOPES = <scope 1:literal> [, <scope n:literal> ]* ]
                 SETSTATEPARAMETER = { TRUE | FALSE }
                     ]
         }
    )
}

<proxy>::= PROXY
    OFF
  | DEFAULT
  | ON ( HOST <literal> PORT <integer> [ <credentials> ] )
  | AUTOMATIC ( PACURI <literal> )

<credentials> ::= USER <literal> PASSWORD <literal> [ ENCRYPTED ]

<ntlm_credentials> ::= <credentials> [ DOMAIN <literal> ]

There are five types of paths in Virtual DataPort:

  1. Local (LOCAL 'LocalConnection'): path to a single file or to a directory. It can be in the local file system of the host where the Virtual DataPort server runs, or in a Windows shared drive.

    When the path is a directory and FILENAMEPATTERN is present, the data source will only process the files whose name matches the regular expression FILENAMEPATTERN. This clause is only valid for custom wrappers and delimited file data sources.

    The parameter CHARSET is available for DF and JSON data sources.

  2. From Variable (LOCAL 'VariableConnection'): use this path if the data is not be obtained from any source but it is provided by clients at runtime, in the WHERE clause of the queries that involve the base views of the data source.

  3. HTTP Client (HTTP 'http.CommonsHttpClientConnection'): path to retrieve a file by sending an HTTP request. The parameters of this path are the following:

    • Timeout: beside http.CommonsHttpClientConnection, you can specify the timeout of the request. For example, http.CommonsHttpClientConnection,120000 indicates that the timeout of the requests will be 2 minutes.

    • HTTP method (GET or PUT or POST or PATCH or DELETE) of the request. This parameter only has to be set with http.CommonsHttpClientConnection and not with http.DenodoBrowserPoolConnection

    • URI of the file of the data source. This Uri can have interpolation variables whose value will be provided at runtime. See section Execution Context of a Query and Interpolation Strings for information about interpolation variables.

    • POSTBODY and MIME (optional): Use the parameter POSTBODY if the HTTP method is POST and you want to set the body of the request. MIME represents the Mime type of the body of this request. E.g. application/json or application/xml

    • HEADERS (optional): use this parameter to set the headers of the HTTP request.

    • CHECKCERTIFICATES (optional): Adding this clause is equivalent to selecting the check box Check certificates of the Configuration tab, in the HTTP client configuration of a path to a file. The section HTTP Path (subsection of Path Types in Virtual DataPort) of the Administration Guide explains when you should enable this option.

    • AUTHENTICATION (optional): If the HTTP server requires authentication, add this parameter to indicate the credentials of the server. The supported authentication methods are BASIC, DIGEST, NTLM, OAuth 1.0a and OAuth 2.0.

      In the authentication methods BASIC, DIGEST and NTLM, if you add the clause WITH PASS-THROUGH SESSION CREDENTIALS, when a user queries a view that uses this data source, Virtual DataPort uses the credentials of this user to authenticate against the HTTP server. In this case, the values of the parameters USERNAME and PASSWORD are used only by the Administration Tool to connect to the database and show the schemas of the database and their tables/views. But not for querying tables or views of the database.

      For the values where you can add the ENCRYPTED modified next to them, you can provide those values in clear or encrypted. For the values you provide encrypted, add the ENCRYPTED modifier next to the value.

      To encrypt a value, execute the statement ENCRYPT_PASSWORD followed by the password. For example, ENCRYPT_PASSWORD 'password';.

      Warning

      Users should be careful when enabling the cache for views that involve data sources with pass-through credentials enabled. The section Considerations When Configuring Data Sources with Pass-Through Credentials explains the issues that may arise.

      The JSON, XML and CUSTOM wrappers support the authentication methods OAuth 1.0a (OAUTH10A) and OAuth 2.0 (OAUTH20). The DF wrappers do not.

      The section OAuth Authentication of the Administration Guide provides more details about these authentication methods.

    • PROXY (optional): If the HTTP request is sent through a proxy, you have three options:

      • DEFAULT: the data source will use the default HTTP proxy configuration of the Server. See the section Default Configuration of HTTP Proxy of the Administration Guide to learn how to configure these default values.

      • ON: the Server will connect to the proxy indicated in the parameters HOST and PORT. If the proxy requires authentication, you also have to provide the credentials of the proxy.

      • AUTOMATIC: provide the URL of a proxy.pac file that contains the configuration parameters of the proxy.

    • The parameter CHARSET is available for DF and JSON data sources.

  4. Denodo Browser (HTTP 'http.DenodoBrowserPoolConnection'): the file is obtained using the Denodo Browser, which can execute complex navigation sequences written in NSEQL (Denodo ITPilot Navigation SEQuence Language).

    The NSEQL sequence is indicated in the uri parameter.

    The browser can be obtained from the internal browser pool or from a remote one. I.e. HTTP 'http.DenodoBrowserPoolConnection, 3, 1' will create a HTTP route using a browser obtained from the internal port. Change the second parameter to 2, to obtain the browser from a remote pool.

    See the Denodo ITPilot User Guide and the NSEQL Manual for more information about the Denodo Browser and the NSEQL sequences.

  5. FTP / FTPS / SFTP (FTP): Path that accesses a file via FTP. The parameters of this path are the following:

    • The URL of the FTP server with the following format: host:port/path/file

    • Login of the user to connect to the FTP server.

    • Password of the user to connect to the FTP server.

    • The clause FILENAMEPATTERN is only valid for custom wrappers and delimited-file data sources.

    • The parameter CHARSET is available for DF and JSON data sources.

For Local or FTP/FTPS/SFTP routes, if URI points to a directory instead of a single file, when you query a base view created over this data source, the Server will retrieve the data from all the files in the directory and not just one file. In this case, the Server assumes that all the files of the directory have the same format as the first one.

Add feedback