Cloudera Connector for Tableau

Installation Guide

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Release Information
Version: 7.0
Date: August, 2013

Table of Contents
Cloudera Connector for Tableau...............................................................................5
Driver Installation and Configuration for Windows...............................................7
Uninstalling the Driver................................................................................................................................7

Limitations of the Cloudera Connector for Tableau...............................................9

Support......................................................................................................................11

Cloudera Connector for Tableau

Cloudera Connector for Tableau

Note: This document only applies to connections to Impala or HiveServer1. If you have upgraded to
HiveServer2, use Tableau 8.0.4 or above with the Cloudera ODBC Driver documentation available here.
The Cloudera Connector for Tableau enables your Enterprise's power users to access Hadoop data through the
Business Intelligence application Tableau 7.0 (or later). The driver achieves this by translating Open Database
Connectivity (ODBC) calls from Tableau into SQL and passing the SQL queries to the underlying Impala or Hive
engines. The driver supports Cloudera Impala 1.0 (and later) and the Apache Hive versions supplied with CDH
4.2 and later.
Version 1.2 of the driver works with the original HiveServer and Beeswax protocols. It supports Kerberos
authentication and multi-client concurrency only when connecting to Impala. This driver supports CDH3u4 (and
later) with Beeswax and CDH4 (and later). This 32-bit driver is supported on Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2
and Windows 7.
As of CDH4.1, you can deploy HiveServer2, an improved version of HiveServer that supports a new Thrift API
tailored for JDBC and ODBC clients, Kerberos authentication, and multi-client concurrency.
Cloudera strongly recommends you install HiveServer2 , and use it whenever possible. (You can still use the
original HiveServer when you need to, and run it concurrently with HiveServer2; see Configuring HiverServer2).
Refer the following sources for more information on Impala and Hive components:
For information on installing Apache Hive with CDH3, see the Hive Installation section of the CDH3 Installation
Guide. Hive user documentation for CDH3 can be found at http://archive.cloudera.com/cdh/3/hive/.
For information on installing Apache Hive with CDH4, see the Hive Installation section of the CDH4 Installation
Guide. Hive user documentation for CDH4 can be found at http://archive.cloudera.com/cdh4/cdh/4/hive/.
For additional information on Apache Hive, see the Apache Hive wiki.
The installation guide for the Cloudera ODBC Driver for Impala is available here.
Important: To connect Impala to your Kerberos-secured CDH clusters, contact your Tableau account
representative for an updated Tableau Data-connection Customization (TDC) file. The updated TDC
file will override the Tableau connection settings to set specific parameters on the connection string
that are required for a secure connection.

Cloudera Connector for Tableau Installation Guide | 5

Driver Installation and Configuration for Windows

Driver Installation and Configuration for Windows

The Windows version of this driver is supported on Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2.
1. Download the driver from the Cloudera downloads site (see the Cloudera ODBC Connectors downloads page).
2. Run the downloaded .exe file to invoke the installation wizard. You will need to accept the license agreement,
and accept or modify the installation location. The driver currently comes only in a 32-bit version, but can
also run on a 64-bit system.
Note: You can perform a silent (non-interactive) installation by running the install executable as
<Install_exe> /S /D="<Dir_to_install>". For example: ClouderaHiveODBCSetup_v1_00.exe
/S /D="C:\Program Files (x86)\Hive ODBC" will install the driver and the uninstall script in
the C:\Program Files (x86)\Hive ODBC directory. The license is accepted automatically in this
mode.
1. Open Tableau Desktop and then select Data > Connect to Data > Cloudera Hadoop.
2. In the Hadoop Hive Connection dialog box, fill in the information, select the appropriate options, and then
click OK.
The installation is now complete.
Important: To connect Impala to your Kerberos-secured CDH clusters, contact your Tableau account
representative for an updated Tableau Data-connection Customization (TDC) file. The updated TDC
file will override the Tableau connection settings to set specific parameters on the connection string
that are required for a secure connection.

Uninstalling the Driver

The uninstall script is placed in the installation directory (by default, C:\Program Files (x86)\Hive ODBC).
To uninstall the driver, run <install_directory>/uninstall.exe. To uninstall silently, add the /S option
(<install_directory>/uninstall.exe /S).

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Limitations of the Cloudera Connector for Tableau

Limitations of the Cloudera Connector for Tableau

Users of this ODBC driver should take the time to familiarize themselves with Apache Hive and its limitations.
Hive user documentation can be found at http://archive.cloudera.com/cdh/3/hive/. Apache Hive is not a
relational database, and does not support many of the features that are typically found in relational database
systems. Missing features include the following:

No support for transactions.

No support for cursors or scrollable cursors.
No support for row level inserts, updates, or deletes.
No explicit support for canceling a running query.
No support for prepared statements.

Users should also be aware that Apache Hive implements its own dialect of SQL called HiveQL. HiveQL does not
satisfy any of the ANSI SQL standards, and also includes extensions to SQL that are not compatible with the
ANSI standard. Users are encouraged to read the Hive Language Manual on the Apache Hive wiki before
attempting to use this driver.
Apache Hive's limitations affect the driver in two ways: (1) many types of SQL statements can not be executed
through the driver because the underlying system (Hive) does not support them, and (2) many functions in the
ODBC API can not be supported on top of Hive because Hive does not provide the required infrastructure.
The following ODBC functions are not supported by the driver:

SQLBindParameter
SQLBrowseConnect
SQLBulkOperations
SQLCancel
SQLCloseCursor
SQLColumnPrivileges
SQLCopyDesc
SQLDataSources
SQLDrivers
SQLEndTrans
SQLGetCursorName
SQLGetDescField
SQLGetDescRec
SQLMoreResults
SQLNativeSQL
SQLParamOptions
SQLPrepare
SQLSetCursorName
SQLSetDescField
SQLSetDescRec
SQLSetPos
SQLSetScrollOptions
SQLTablePrivileges
SQLTransact

The driver provides support for the following ODBC functions, though bugs may be present:
SQLAllocConnect
SQLAllocEnv
SQLAllocHandle
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Limitations of the Cloudera Connector for Tableau

SQLAllocStmt
SQLBindCol
SQLColAttribute
SQLColAttributes
SQLColumns
SQLConnect
SQLDescribeCol
SQLDescribeParam
SQLDisconnect
SQLDriverConnect
SQLError
SQLExecDirect
SQLExecute
SQLFetch
SQLForeignKeys
SQLFreeConnect
SQLFreeEnv
SQLFreeHandle
SQLFreeStmt
SQLGetConnectAttr
SQLGetConnectOption
SQLGetConnectionOption
SQLGetData
SQLGetDiagField
SQLGetDiagRec
SQLGetEnvAttr
SQLGetFunctions
SQLGetInfo
SQLGetStmtAttr
SQLGetStmtOption
SQLGetTypeInfo
SQLNumParams
SQLNumResultCols
SQLParamData
SQLPrimaryKeys
SQLProcedureColumns
SQLProcedures
SQLPutData
SQLRowCount (Always returns -1)
SQLSetConnectAttr
SQLSetEnvAttr
SQLSetParam
SQLSetStmtAttr
SQLSetStmtOption
SQLSpecialColumns
SQLStatistics
SQLTables

10 | Cloudera Connector for Tableau Installation Guide

Support

Support
For Cloudera Enterprise subscription customers, Cloudera will provide support for the ODBC Driver for Apache
Hive used with the following artifacts and versions:
Artifact

Version

Hadoop Distribution

CDH3u2 and later Hive 0.7.1

BI Tool

Tableau 7.0

Operating System

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2

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