Live Access

Live Access provides a real-time connection to data in local data marts and data warehouses without requiring that data to first be uploaded into the Birst data store (warehouse).

With Live Access, a Birst logical model maps directly onto a local physical relational database or XMLA defined cubes. When reports call logical queries, Birst translates them into physical queries and runs them against the local source instead of against the Birst data store.

Tip: If your use case is not supproted via Live Access, consider using Extraction.

Implementation and Usage Notes

  • Live Access can be used with both Birst Connect 1.0 and Birst Connect 2.0.
  • There is a 30MB limit to Live Access queries. If your query exceeds the limit, use filters to reduce the size.
  •  Filters in excess of 250 using non-whitelisted database may have issues returning more than the first 250.
  • To improve performance, you can specify the "time to live" in the cache for queries on a Live Access source. See Caching Live Access Queries.
  • Important! Custom attributes, custom measures, and bucketed measures cannot be used with Live Access sources. Instead, (for RDBMS sources only), you add custom columns and expressions directly to your Live Access sources by adding a column to the source and giving it a formula under the formula field column. See Adding Custom Columns and Custom Expressions to a Live Access Source.
  • Birst variables are supported for Live Access Cloud deployments.
  • If you use the Admin - Define Sources - Data Flow tab to map Live Access sources you should not use Manage Local Sources to modify them. Conversely, if you have used Manage Local Sources to map your Live Access sources, you should continue to use Manage Local Sources and should not use the Data Flow tab to modify them.
  • Live Access automatically selects a primary key on import.
  • Live Access automatically detects joins on import.
  • For sources modeled in the Data Flow tab you can set the time-to-live (TTL) of the cache in the Data Flow tab.
  • For diagrams showing how Live Access interacts with the Birst Server, see Multiple Instances of Live Access.
  • Important: End user data blending capabilities are not supported with Live Access sources.
  • When you create a new automatic mode space and establish a Live Access connection in Birst Connect, the Manage Local Sources - Add button for adding a Live Access source in Data Flow is disabled. Convert the space to Advanced mode to use Data Flow to add Live Access sources.
  • You can add the same Live Access Sources multiple times to a space in Modeler> Relate. If a source with the same name as an existing source is added, the application creates the source with the name - n where n is the iteration of that same source. For example, if a user adds a source of "Orders" to a space and then adds it again, the second source is "Orders-1".
  • Important: If the table structure or cubes you are creating Live Access connections change, you will need to update your Live Access data model definitions as follows:
    • Determine how the structures changed in the source systems for any columns that were removed, added or changed (data type). You will then need to manually edit your data model in Birst to reflect the changes. If your Birst data model has several joins you may find this option to be the optimal solution.
    • Another alternative to manually editing your existing Live Access source is to delete the source and re-import the updated source which will then be updated with the updated table or cube structure changes. Note: As mentioned in the previous option, if your source has several joins, manually editing the existing source may be the better option.
    • A third possible alternative is to connect the Live Access source in another separate space, and then compare and merge across the spaces to update the space for the new structure changes. For more information about comparing and merging spaces, see Comparing and Merging Spaces. Note: If a space you are attempting to compare and merge contains a non-existent Live Access source connection, the merge operation will return an error similar to the following: "DEBUG - The source: 'ST_Orders' is from a live access connection: 'conn1' which is not present in the current space. Hence cannot pull the source." You will need to use one of the aforementioned methods to update your Live Access connections and Data model.
  • For more information about data modeling a Live Acces RDBMS source, see Modeling a Live Access Relational Database Source. For more information about Modeling a XMLA cube Live Access source, see Modeling a Live Access XMLA Source.

Using Live Access with an RDBMS

Birst translates logical queries into physical SQL queries and runs them against the local RDBMS source instead of against the Birst data store.

Birst Connect Live Access provides a set of RDBMS database drivers.

To set up connections and models for RDBMS data sources see:

Additional Features for RDBMS Connections

Using Live Access with XMLA

Live Access can connect to multi-dimensional cubes via an XMLA metadata interface. Live Access automatically retrieves hierarchies, dimension elements, and measures from an XMLA repository environment and translates them directly into Birst hierarchies, dimensions and measures.

Birst translates logical queries into MDX queries and runs them against the local XMLA cube source instead of against the Birst data store.

To set up connections and models for XMLA data sources see:

Creating a Live Access Connection for XMLA

Modeling a Live Access XMLA Source

Additional Features for XMLA Connections

In addition to caching queries, Birst caches XMLA metadata.