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How do I connect Visual Studio Connector to Discourse in 5 minutes?

Execute the following steps to connect Visual Studio Connector to Discourse. You only need knowledge of Visual Studio Connector, your own business and the Discourse administration.

Discourse is a cloud forum and mailing list management software application. Discourse can be used to increase community co-operation. The source is available as open source. Discourse runs for over 1,500 companies.

No technical knowledge is needed nor knowledge on the Discourse APIs to connect Discourse to Visual Studio Connector. This step-by-step plan will tell you exactly which steps you need to go through on Invantive Cloud to create your own Azure data warehouse with data from Discourse.

The steps to connect Visual Studio Connector to Discourse are:

  1. Register an Invantive Cloud account.
  2. Create a Discourse database.
  3. Make the Discourse database available through the Microsoft OData connector.
  4. Connect Visual Studio Connector to Discourse through the connector.
  5. Load data from Discourse into Visual Studio Connector data warehouse.

Invantive Cloud offers a Discourse connector to download data from Discourse into Visual Studio Connector, but there are over 75 other connectors available also for SQL, Power BI Desktop, Power BI Service, Power Query and/or Azure Data Factory.

With the Discourse connector for Visual Studio Connector you will by default fetch the data from all connected Discourse companies in your dashboard. You can limit the number of Discourse companies that are retrieved in Visual Studio Connector through the Database settings. For example, you can also limit the connector for Visual Studio Connector to the data from exactly one Discourse company. Of course, you can also filter the data by a specific Discourse company using a filter step in Visual Studio Connector. The Discourse connector for Visual Studio Connector has advanced optimizations for great real-time performance with both a single Discourse company as well as with hundreds of Discourse companies.

When you are having questions, please check the forums for Discourse. Every organisation is entitled to 1 hour of free training to help you get started. This free hour also applies to free plans.

Register Account on Invantive Cloud

Skip this step when you already have an account on Invantive Cloud. Otherwise execute the following steps one time to register an account on Invantive Cloud:

  1. Go to Invantive Cloud start page.

  2. Select the Log on-button.

  3. Select the Sign Up-button. Sign Up to Invantive Cloud.

  4. Enter your business email address. Enter business email address.

  5. Select the Next-button.

  6. Enter your personal data. Enter personal data.

  7. Select the Next-button.

  8. Enter your password and repeat the provided password.

  9. Select the Next-button. Enter two identical passwords.

  10. You will receive a six-digit verification code by email within 2 minutes.

  11. Enter the six-digit verification code. Six-digit verification code to validate email address.

  12. Select the Sign Up-button.

  13. Log on now. > Sign Up.

  14. Make sure you have an authentication app installed on your phone. Select the Next-button. Prepare TOTP-configuration.

  15. Add the displayed QR code to the authentication app, enter the current verification code, and choose "Finish". Scan QR-code into TOTP-app and enter current code.

  16. Skip registration of the organization. Skip company registration.

  17. Complete your personal data and choose 'Save'. Complete personal data.

  18. Go to the dashboard. Navigate to dashboard.

  19. The Invantive Cloud dashboard will be shown.

You now have a login code on Invantive Cloud with which you can set up the connection with Discourse and numerous other platforms. You will use the same Invantive login code and workflow for all other platforms.

Create Discourse database

In this step, we set up a database with data from Discourse. The database is "virtual" because it is not a traditional database, but is fed real-time from Discourse. Invantive Cloud provides Visual Studio Connector with a real-time link to Discourse. The database will be used for all your Discourse reporting with Visual Studio Connector. So you only need to perform these steps once.

  1. Click the Add Database button. Add database.

  2. Select Discourse from the list. Select Discourse connector.

  3. Please fill out the form with login information for Discourse.

  4. Select the OK-button.

Congratulations! You can now process data from Discourse within the Invantive Cloud website. You can do this for example with the interactive SQL editor.

Grant connection from Visual Studio Connector access to Discourse

To retrieve the data from Visual Studio Connector we create a link via Invantive Bridge Online. This creates a "bridge" between the cloud of Invantive and the standard OData connector that is available in every version of Visual Studio Connector. You do not need to install anything locally: no connector, no ado.NET provider and no Visual Studio Connector add-on neither.

Execute the following steps to safely use the data from Discourse outside of Invantive Cloud:

  1. Next to the database you will find an orange text requesting you to allow access from your current location (IP address). Select the nearby orange button.

  2. You must completely disable IP address checking by entering an asterisk ("*") since Microsoft Visual Studio Connector consists of hundreds of thousands of servers across the globe.

You are now ready to import the Discourse data into Visual Studio Connector.

Configure Visual Studio Connector connector for Discourse

You will now pull in Visual Studio Connector data from Discourse through the established link.

Please note again that Invantive Cloud under the hood handles all complexity such as setting up credentials such as a refresh token, acquiring an access token, optimizing and parallelizing access, accessing an API within the rate limits, scopes and security restrictions. There is absolutely no need for knowledge on complex technical topics such as OAuth access tokens or API. The Microsoft Azure Data Factory steps, activities and pipelines can be constructed using just the OData feed and basic authentication.

Execute the following steps:

  1. Start Microsoft Visual Studio Connector and select 'Ingest'. Copy Discourse data using Microsoft Azure Data Factory activity 'Ingest'

  2. Select 'Built-in copy task'. Built-in copy using Discourse as source

  3. Select source type 'OData' and select 'New connection'. OData connection for Discourse to Microsoft Azure Data Factory

  4. Enter in the window the Bridge Online URL of the Visual Studio Connector database. This URL containing the data can be found in the Database-form of Invantive Cloud. Choose authentication type 'Basic authentication'. Enter the Invantive Cloud user name and password. OData URL for Discourse with log on credentials

  5. The list of available Discourse tables appears. Select the desired tables and construct your pipeline in Microsoft Azure Data Factory. Select Discourse tables and process them in Microsoft Azure Data Factory