SAP HANA

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Creating the Looker user

Create a Looker database user with a secure password.

CREATE USER LOOKER PASSWORD <SOME_PASSWORD>

Granting permissions

Grant read permissions on the schema(s) that you would like to use in Looker.

GRANT SELECT ON SCHEMA <YOUR_SCHEMA> TO LOOKER

Setting up a PDT schema

If using PDTs, create a scratch schema for PDTs to be written into.

CREATE SCHEMA LOOKER_SCRATCH OWNED BY LOOKER

Configuring a connection

To connect a SAP HANA database to Looker:

  1. In the Admin section of Looker, select Connections, and then click Add Connection.

  2. Fill out the connection details (see the Connecting Looker to your database documentation page for more information):

    • Name: The name of the connection. This is how you will refer to the connection in LookML projects.
    • Dialect: SAP HANA.
    • Port: The database port. The default port is 30015.
    • Host: Hostname.
    • Database: The name of your database.
    • Username: The database username.
    • Password: The user password.
    • Schema: The default schema to use when none is specified. Entering a schema is optional.
    • Persistent Derived Tables: Check this box to enable persistent derived tables.
    • Temp Database: Schema to use for PDTs.
    • Additional Params: Any additional SAP HANA JDBC connection properties.
    • PDT and Datagroup Maintenance Schedule: A cron expression that indicates when Looker should check datagroups and persistent derived tables. Read more about this setting in our PDT and Datagroup Maintenance Schedule documentation.
    • SSL: Check to enable SSL.
    • Verify SSL: Check to enforce strict hostname verification.
    • Max Connections: The default is 25.
    • Connection Pool Timeout: The default is 120 seconds.
    • SQL Runner Precache: To cause SQL Runner not to preload table information and to load table information only when a table is selected, uncheck this option. Read more about this setting in our SQL Runner Precache documentation.
    • Database Time Zone: Specify the time zone used in the database. Leave this field blank if you do not want time zone conversion. See the Using time zone settings documentation page for more information.

  3. Click Test These Settings to verify a connection.

    If you have any issues, check out our Testing Connections documentation.

  4. Click Add Connection to save these settings.

  5. Test the connection in SQL Runner. Navigate to SQL Runner, select your connection and schema, and then check if you can see your database tables.

Feature support

For Looker to support some features, your database dialect must also support them.

SAP HANA supports the following features as of Looker 23.4:

Feature Supported?
Support Level
Supported
Symmetric Aggregates
Yes
Derived Tables
Yes
Persistent SQL Derived Tables
Yes
Persistent Native Derived Tables
Yes
Stable Views
Yes
Query Killing
Yes
Pivots
No
Timezones
No
SSL
Yes
Subtotals
No
JDBC Additional Params
Yes
Case Sensitive
Yes
Location Type
Yes
List Type
No
Percentile
No
Distinct Percentile
No
SQL Runner Show Processes
Yes
SQL Runner Describe Table
Yes
SQL Runner Show Indexes
No
SQL Runner Select 10
Yes
SQL Runner Count
Yes
SQL Explain
No
Oauth Credentials
No
Context Comments
Yes
Connection Pooling
No
HLL Sketches
No
Aggregate Awareness
Yes
Incremental PDTs
No
Milliseconds
Yes
Microseconds
Yes
Materialized Views
No
Approximate Count Distinct
No

Next steps

After completing the database connection, configure authentication options.