Salesforce Connections
You can create connections to your Salesforce instance from the Alteryx Analytics Cloud. This connector is designed as a wrapper around the Salesforce REST API.
Limitations
Note
During normal selection or import of an entire table, you may encounter an error indicating a problem with a specific column. Since some tables require filtering based on a particular column, data from them can only be ingested using custom SQL statements. In this case, the problematic column can be used as a filter in the WHERE clause of a custom SQL statement to ingest the table.
For more information, please consult the CData driver documentation for the specific table.
For more information on using custom SQL, see Create Dataset with SQL.
Note
For filtering date columns, this connection type supports a set of literal functions on dates. You can use these to reduce the volume of data extracted from the database using a custom SQL query. For more information, see the pg_dateliteralfunctions.htm page in the driver documentation for this connection type.
This is a read-only connection.
Single Sign-On (SSO) is not supported.
Custom domains are not supported.
You cannot ingest Salesforce tables that require mandatory filters.
Prerequisites
The account used to login from the Alteryx Analytics Cloud must access Salesforce through a security token.
Note
Please contact your Salesforce administrator for the Server Name and the Security Token values.
The logged-in user must have required access to the tables and schema.
Configure
To create this connection, in theConnections page, select the Applications tab. Click the Salesforce card. See Connections Page.
Modify the following properties as needed:
Property | Description |
|---|---|
Server Name | Enter the host name of your Salesforce implementation. Example value: exampleserver.salesforce.com |
Connect String Options | Apply any connection string options that are part of your authentication to Salesforce. For more information, see below. |
Credential Type | Select the type of credentials to provide with the connection:
|
OAuth 2.0 Client | (OAuth 2.0 credential type) Select the OAuth 2.0 client to use. |
User Name | (SecurityToken credential type) Username to use to connect to the database. |
Password | (SecurityToken credential type) Password associated with the above username. |
Security Token generated in account | (SecurityToken credential type) Paste the security token associated with the account to use for this connection. |
Test Connection | (SecurityToken credential type) After you have defined the connection credentials type, credentials, and connection string, you can validate those credentials. |
Default Column Data Type Inference | Set to |
Connection Name | Display name of the connection |
Connection Description | Description of the connection, which appears in the application. |
Connect to Sandbox account
If you are connecting to a Salesforce sandbox account, the following property values must be modified:
Property | Sandbox Value |
|---|---|
Server Name | test.salesforce.com |
Connect String Options | Please append the following to your connect string options: UseSandbox=true; For more information, see below. |
OAuth 2.0 client | Select |
User Name | (Security token credential type) Append the name of the sandbox environment to the end of the username. In the following, the sandbox environment is exampleUser@example.com.demo |
Connect string options
Connection timeout
By default, the supported driver applies a connection timeout to Salesforce of 60 seconds. As needed, you can modify the connection timeout through connect string options:
timeout=<value_in_seconds>
where:
<value_in_seconds> corresponds to the number of seconds for the time.
Note
Although it is not recommended, you can set this value to 0 to disable timeouts.
Schema caching
By default, the connection driver uses schema caching to speed up ingestion. To surface changes to Salesforce tables/schema immediately, you can use the following options to disable schema caching by the connection:
Other='cachemetadatatable=false;cachemetadatatablecolumns=false;'
Create via API
This connection can also be created using the API.
Note
If you are using OAuth 2.0 authentication for this type, you cannot create connections via API.
Type:
jdbcVendor:
salesforce
For more information, see Coming soon.
Use
You can import datasets from Salesforce. See Database Browser.
Using Salesforce Connections
Uses of Salesforce
The Alteryx Analytics Cloud can use Salesforce for the following tasks:
Create datasets by reading from Salesforce tables.
Before you begin using Salesforce
Read Access:
Your Salesforce administrator must configure read permissions.
You must acquire a Salesforce security token for use with the Salesforce connection.
Secure access
SSL is the default connection method.
Storing data in Salesforce
Your Salesforce administrator should provide database access for storing datasets. Users should know where shared data is located and where personal data can be saved without interfering with or confusing other users.
Note
The Alteryx Analytics Cloud does not modify source data in Salesforce. Datasets sourced from Salesforce are read without modification from their source locations.
Reading from Salesforce
When the Alteryx Analytics Cloud connects to your Salesforce instance, the application can read from all Salesforce objects that are accessible through the Salesforce account in use, including:
Salesforce objects and fields are mapped to tables and columns
Standard and custom objects
Note
The names of custom objects are appended with the value
_c.Audit columns
System fields
Note
Unquoted identifiers are converted to uppercase during import.
You can create a Alteryx dataset from a table stored in Salesforce.
Writing to Salesforce
Not supported.
Reference
Supported Versions: n/a
Supported Environments:
Read: Supported
Write: Not supported