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Anonymous
Not applicable

REST Connection to Google Analytics

I use Qlik Sense for desktop. I have been trying to follow this video: Connecting to Google Analytics using Qlik REST Connector - YouTube to establish a connection between Qlik Sense and a GA account that handles one website. The connection establishes fine, although some differences between the video process and my process should be taken note of. Please note that I am quite new with this stuff so some of these might be insignificant. I just try to be as granular as possible as I don't know what makes a difference and what doesn't:

  • In the video the API provides a "200 OK" response to the API creation request, I am only provided with a "200" response
  • I cannot use the default settings for authentication as they have changed from the video, I must instead press "Skip server certificate validation" and select the "Anonymous" option to get it to establish the connection

When this is done the connection is established, but the only data it provides is as is displayed in the screenshot provided.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.qliksenseissue.PNG

2 Replies
Demlet
Contributor III
Contributor III

Hi Theodore,

I followed that video as well, and couldn't get QlikSense to even recognize the returned JSON.

Additionally when you do return data effectively, it isn't in a very digestible format. For example it will be all in one column, and what you would expect to be a column header would just be a row.

Also the Google OAuth you set up will time out after 4ish hours, and you will need to accommodate for that in your script. I have seen users POST back to Google to refresh the token every 4 hours.

I would recommend looking into the "Google Analytics Connector", which is available for purchase. I have surmised that Qlik makes custom connectors for sources that are widely used, but not easily to connected to... Google Analytics being one of them.

If you do get something working please post on Qlik Community, as there isn't a whole lot of recent updates using the REST connector.

Best regards,

-Derek

Anonymous
Not applicable
Author

Hello Derek,

Yes it does indeed seem like a hassle. I did know about the data formatting issue before but did not know about the GoogleOAuth. As a matter of fact, I never did get it to work as I couldn't for the life of me figure it out. I might have been lucky not to spend more time in retrospect.

As for the Analytics Connector I was aware of its existence, however our project is quite large and we fear that the connector might get expensive. I did figure out another way though, and I actually believe that my method could be effective for any project involving getting data out of a Google application to Qlik without paying for Qlik features.

I used the Google Core Reporting API to load data into a Google Sheet. Google provides a VERY easy feature to automate script running. Actually, I later found out Google has made a Sheet Add-On that does the same job, so use that to do it faster.

After loading the data into the Sheet, it is simply a matter of using the free Sheet Web Connector to set everything up. Up until now, this has worked perfectly for my purposes and might be something for you to try out if nothing else will do the trick!

Kind regards,

Théodore