Civis Platform Looker Studio Connector

Overview

The Civis Platform Community Connector for Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio) enables Platform users to build Data Studio reports with their data. Users can create Looker Studio Data Sources based on any Platform table or write a custom SQL statement to filter reporting data.

Requirements & Limitations

In order to create Looker Studio Data Sources with the Civis connector, you’ll first need to generate a Platform API key for the connector. Note this will need to be refreshed whenever the key expires to ensure your data continues to refresh successfully. When the key expires, the "Reconnect" button will be available on the data connection.

Data Sources created by Community Connectors are limited to importing one million rows of data. We recommend that Data Sources return under 100,000 rows for best performance (either Platform table or SQL query results).

Google limits the number of times a connector can be run simultaneously by a single user. In case all data sources need to update at once, we recommend keeping the number of data connections per report under 30.

Setup

1. In Looker Studio, Create > Data Source (Note: this can also be done from a report: Add Data > Connect to Data)
2. Search for “Civis Platform”, it will appear  under “Partner Connectors”
3. Input Platform API key
4. Select Database name and credential ID (You can leave the credential ID field blank to use your default database credential)
5. Choose Data Source Type: Platform table or custom SQL statement
1. If you select Platform table, select the relevant schema and table
2. If you select Custom SQL, input a valid SQL query from the selected database
6. Click Connect / Add

What if my API Key expires?

Platform API keys have an expiration date.  When an API key expires, the reports that are powered by Platform’s Data Sources will look like the following:

When you click on “Authorize now”, Looker Studio will ask you to re-authenticate with a new API key.  Input the new API key and the reports will begin working again.

Data Types

Due to data type differences between Civis databases and Looker Studio you may need to add or edit Data Source fields to convert types.

• If your Data Source is a Platform table, the connector will automatically identify the corresponding data types for each field.
  • For Redshift ‘date’ fields, the connector will create two corresponding fields, one with a name that matches Redshift as a text field, and another named “gds_[redshift_name]” as a date field
  • Redshift ‘timestamp’ fields will only have text fields. We recommend adding a field and using the PARSE_DATE function to derive a date in Data Studio from timestamp fields, ex: PARSE_DATE("%Y-%m-%d 00:00:00",date_trunc)
• If your Data Source is a custom SQL statement, all fields are created as ‘text’ fields. You can create new fields with adjusted types by adding fields and then using functions to calculate new values.
  • All fields are required to have a unique column name. Queries made through the Civis Platform UI or API automatically deduplicate fields. Check for any duplicate column names if the query succeeds in Platform but fails to create a Looker Studio data source.

Data Freshness

In order to load reports quickly, Looker Studio caches the results of queries and table exports. More information about how Looker Studio accomplishes this is available in their help documentation on Data Freshness. For community connectors, including the Civis Platform connector, the freshness options are set to 12 hours.

Terms

Civis affirms that the Civis Platform Looker Studio Connector complies with all relevant terms and conditions. The use of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Chrome Web Store User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. For more information, see Civis's Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.