Oracle

Note

You might want to start with our resources on data connections in the Knowledge Base.

DSS supports the full range of features on Oracle and Exadata:

  • Reading and writing datasets

  • Executing SQL recipes

  • Performing visual recipes in-database

  • Using live engine for charts

Installing the JDBC driver

The Oracle JDBC driver can be downloaded from Oracle website.

  • Select the driver page corresponding to your Oracle database version

  • Look for “JDBC Thin driver from the Oracle database release”

  • Download the ojdbcX.jar file (you’ll need to accept the license agreement first, you may need to create an account)

    The driver is a single JAR file called ojdbcX.jar where ‘X’ is the minimum supported Java release (eg ojdbc7.jar requires Java 7 or later, ojdbc8.jar requires Java 8 or later)

  • Copy the JAR file to the lib/jdbc driver of DSS

  • Restart DSS

Advanced connection properties

Connect using Service Name

The Oracle connection expects an Oracle SID in the “Service name” parameter. If you need to connect with a true Service name, you can connect by toggling the “Use custom JDBC URL” parameter on and using the following Connection URL format:

jdbc:oracle:thin:@//[HOST][:PORT]/SERVICE_NAME

Kerberos authentication

In default connection mode, DSS authenticates to Oracle by way of a username and password defined in the connection configuration page.

Alternatively, it is possible for DSS to connect to the database with Kerberos authentication, provided a number of prerequisites are met:

  • Kerberos 5 authentication should be enabled on the database.

  • The Kerberos client configuration file (typically /etc/krb5.conf) should be correctly configured on the DSS host.

  • Create a Kerberos account for DSS on the KDC (or domain controller) and note the Kerberos principal for it, say DSSKerberosPrincipal@KERBEROS.REALM.

  • Create a keytab file for this account, and store it in a file accessible only to DSS.

  • Create an externally authenticated user account in the Oracle database, mapped to this Kerberos principal. This is typically done with:

    CREATE USER dssOracleUser IDENTIFIED EXTERNALLY AS '[email protected]';

  • At the DSS level, configure the Oracle connection as follows:

    • Login with Kerberos: enabled

    • Principal: the Kerberos principal created above

    • Keytab: absolute path to the keytab file for this Kerberos principal

    • Advanced JDBC properties: add any Oracle-specific advanced connection properties required by your database setup. This would typically be:

      oracle.net.authentication_services : (KERBEROS5)
oracle.net.kerberos5_mutual_authentication : true

User impersonation

Note

This feature is part of the User Isolation Framework and requires an Enterprise license of DSS.

It is possible to configure the Oracle DSS connection to authenticate to the database using one Oracle account, and perform all data manipulation and SQL queries using another. This typically allows DSS to impersonate its end-users when accessing the database, much as is done for Hadoop or local computations when running in User Isolation Framework mode.

At the DSS level, this is configured by entering the Oracle account name to impersonate in the Impersonated user field of the connection configuration page.

Typical uses of this feature would include:

  • defining this field as %{dssUserLogin} to directly use the DSS user login name as Oracle account name, in case the DSS and Oracle account databases match one-for-one

  • defining this field as %{adminProperty:oracleLogin} where oracleLogin is a custom per-user admin property defined in the DSS user database, in the more general case where usernames have to be remapped

At the Oracle level, this impersonation mechanism uses the native Oracle “proxy authentication” feature, and should have been authorized accordingly by the database administrator. This is typically done with one of the following directives:

-- authorizes the DSS service account to impersonate Oracle user 'jeff'
ALTER USER jeff GRANT CONNECT THROUGH dssOracleUser;

-- authorizes the DSS service account to impersonate Oracle user 'jeff' for a subset of its roles
ALTER USER jeff GRANT CONNECT THROUGH dssOracleUser ROLE role1, role2;

Note

When the connection is configured for impersonation, the DSS service account itself only needs to be granted authorization to connect to the database, as in:

GRANT CREATE SESSION TO dssOracleUser;