Power BI connection to Content Server documents

Pascal_SSC · 2020-12-08T19:09:43+00:00

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Hello,

I am wondering if anyone has found a way to connect Power BI Online to a data source of Excel documents in Content Server. In particular, without having to manually perform a Get every time there's a new version of the Content Server document with updated data. So far I can do this with the desktop version of Power BI using Extended Integration of Enterprise Connect. But the limitation is that only the one user who sets up the document link can import updated information from Content Server documents since the link's path is their Office Editor local cache. We would ideally like to find a way that Power BI Online could access Content Server documents for any users wanting the up-to-date data. I'm thinking this might require the use of programmatic access like Content Web Services but I don't have much experience with this. Does anyone know if this is possible and if so could point me where to start?

Any ideas are greatly welcome :).

Thanks,

Pascal

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Karen Weir

Hi @pascal.desjardins@canada.ca , I see that our Support team advised that there is no integration available. Have you been able address this scenario in another way?

Pascal_SSC

Hello Karen,

No, I have not resolved this yet, however I do have a lead that I will be pursuing in the near future following the suggested Rest API code here:

https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Developer/Opentext-Content-Server/td-p/809913

Any feedback on this or other ideas are very welcome.

Thanks,

Pascal

Appu Nair

The hardcoding can be avoided by OTDS integration and SSO. Here are the most common approaches as I do not know what BI is but I am assuming it is like MSword or something like that.

You should go and basically setup OTDS for SSO. This is a very simple setup for CS. Behind the scenes, your browser will send the Kerberos or NTLM creds to OTDS so it knows.OTDS will SP Negotiate it and return a token. You can use that token in your rest call so where https://forums.opentext.com/forums/developer/discussion/comment/948129#Comment_948129 see where Chris Webster of OT has put a KB then the code in the community.powerbi can be used
Another way I use in our product integration is I keep a superuser in config(not in javascript realm but java code realm). When the java code runs on server-side I will get an OTDS token for the superuser. Then I know who is using my application so I ask OTDS can you give me a token for that user. If so I use that token.
BTW if you ever get to a hidden page or anything that CS has authenticated you then you have a cookie called LLCookie.I think this is the approach SmartUI uses, so the small page no one sees, then they pass the LLCookie as the otcsticket note CS will understand both otdsticket and otcsticket.
There's still one more useful method although I have not understood it fully. For integrating applications one can use OAUTH. @Nizar_Ghazal has shown you some way https://forums.opentext.com/forums/support/discussion/302374/bearertoken-from-otds-for-empower-and-communication-server-ce-20-4#latest

I only request you to post your experiences using the methods so we all can be well informed.

elijahkrieger4

I'm curious too if anyone has found a way to connect Power BI Online to Excel documents in Content Server without having to manually perform a Get every time there's a new version. It's great that you're able to do this with the desktop version of Power BI using Extended Integration of Enterprise Connect, but I understand the limitation of only one user being able to import updated information due to the link's path being their Office Editor local cache. Perhaps programmatic access like Content Web Services could be a solution, but I'm not too familiar with it myself. Maybe someone with more experience can chime in? Also, if you're looking for Power BI certification, I recommend checking out Microsoft's official certification program for Power BI. Good luck with your data integration endeavors!