Connect to MySQL

Sigma supports secure connections to MySQL (release 8.0 and higher).

This document explains how to connect your organization to a MySQL database.

📘

For information about Sigma feature compatibility with MySQL connections, see Region, warehouse, and feature support.

Customers

 Request access to this feature through your Account Representative.

Prospects

 Request access to this feature through our Sales team.

Requirements

• Admin privileges in your Sigma organization. For more information, see User account types.
• A MySQL account with READ privileges for the relevant databases and tables. If you are planning to upload CSV data, the account must have WRITE privileges.
• Sigma supports MySQL version 8.0 and higher.
• We recommend that you avoid granting excessive permissions to the account you use when connecting to your data store; for example, you do not require SYSADMIN-level access.
• MySQL on Azure does not have named timezones by default, so you must load the timezone data into your MySQL database for Sigma to operate properly. Otherwise, you may have an error when setting up a connection. See Microsoft documentation on Populating the time zone tables. This is not an issue for MySQL on AWS or GCP.

Create a connection

Follow these basic steps to create a connection:

1. Click the user icon at the top right of your screen. 
   The user icon is usually composed of your initials.

2. In the drop-down menu, select Add connection.
   

3. The Add new connections page appears.
   

4. In the Connection details, specify these:

   Name

   Specify the Name of the new connection. Sigma displays this name in the connection list.

   Here, we use MySQL connection.

   Type

   Select the tile that represents the data warehouse you use.

   Here, click the MySQL tile.

5. In the Connection Credentials section, specify the following:

   Host

   The path to your database.

   This can be a URL, or an IP address.

   Port

   The port that Sigma uses to connect to the host.

   The default port for MySQL is 3306

   User

   The username, or account, for connecting to the MySQL data warehouse.

   For example, test.

   Password

   Enter the password that corresponds to the User on the MySQL account.

   Database

   The name of the database you plan to query.

   Enable TLS

   Optional.

   This switch enables or disables TLS encryption on your connection.

   Enabled by default.

   SSH Tunnel

   Optional.

   This switch enables the SSH protocol for secure remote login. For details, see Connect through SSH.

   Disabled by default.

   If on, specify the Tunnel host and Tunnel port fields.

   Tunnel host

   The path to the tunnel server.

   This can be a URL, or an IP address.

   Appears only if SSH Tunnel is on.

   Tunnel port

   The port where the tunnel connects.

   Appears only if SSH Tunnel is on.

   

6. In the Connection Features section, specify the following:

   Connection timeout

   The time before timeout (or cancellation), in seconds, that Sigma waits for the query to return results.

   Default is 120, or 2 minutes.

   Maximum is 600, or 10 minutes.

   Use friendly names

   This switch makes column names from the data source more readable.

   For example, a database column ORDER_NUMBER appears as Order Number.

   On by default.

   

7. In the Write Access section, decide if you require write access.
   See Set up write access.

   Enable write access

   Necessary for CSV upload and Materialization.

   Off by default.

   If on, specify the Write schema field.

   Write schema

   The schema where Sigma writes tables. 

   Appears only if Enable write access is on.

   

8. After you specify all the parameters of the connection, click Create.
   

9. After you successfully create your connection, Sigma displays it on the screen.
   

10. To verify your connection, click Browse Connection, and then explore the visible databases and tables.
    

11. Click Add Permission to grant data access for users in your organization.
    See Data permissions.
    

12. The new connection also appears in the list of connections you have in your account.