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Salesforce Platform Event Source Connector for Confluent Cloud

The Kafka Connect Salesforce Platform Event Source connector for Confluent Cloud provides a way to subscribe to Salesforce Platform Events and write them to an Apache Kafka® topic.

Important

If you are still on Confluent Cloud Enterprise, please contact your Confluent Account Executive for more information about using this connector.

Features

The Salesforce Platform Event Source connector provides the following features:

  • Uses the Salesforce streaming API: This connector uses the Salesforce Streaming API for Platform Events.
  • Set an initial start: Start consuming new platform events or start by consuming all events from the last 72 hours.
  • Supported data formats: The connector supports Avro, JSON Schema, Protobuf, or JSON (schemaless) output data. Schema Registry must be enabled to use a Schema Registry-based format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).
  • Tasks per connector: Organizations can run multiple connectors with a limit of one task per connector (that is, "tasks.max": "1").

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect section.

For more information, see the Confluent Cloud connector limitations.

Quick Start

Use this quick start to get up and running with the Salesforce Platform Event Source connector. The quick start provides the basics of selecting the connector and configuring it to subscribe to a Salesforce Platform Event.

Prerequisites
  • Authorized access to a Confluent Cloud cluster on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure (Azure), or Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
  • The Confluent Cloud CLI installed and configured for the cluster. See Install the Confluent Cloud CLI.
  • Schema Registry must be enabled to use a Schema Registry-based format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).
  • At least one topic must exist in your Confluent Cloud cluster before creating the connector.
  • The Salesforce account should have at least one Platform Event to subscribe to. You will need to know the security token, key, and secret used for the Salesforce account when setting up the connector.
  • For networking considerations, see Internet access to resources. To use static egress IPs, see Static Egress IP Addresses.
  • Kafka cluster credentials. You can use one of the following ways to get credentials:
    • Create a Confluent Cloud API key and secret. To create a key and secret, you can use the Confluent Cloud CLI or you can autogenerate the API key and secret directly in the Cloud Console when setting up the connector.
    • Create a Confluent Cloud service account for the connector. Make sure to review the ACL entries required in the service account documentation. Some connectors have specific ACL requirements.

Using the Confluent Cloud Console

Step 1: Launch your Confluent Cloud cluster.

See the Quick Start for Apache Kafka using Confluent Cloud for installation instructions.

Step 2: Add a connector.

Click Connectors. If you already have connectors in your cluster, click Add connector.

Step 3: Select your connector.

Click the Salesforce Platform Event Source connector icon.

Salesforce Platform Event Source Connector Icon

Important

At least one topic must exist in your Confluent Cloud cluster before creating the connector.

Step 4: Set up the connection.

Complete the following and click Continue.

Note

  • Make sure you have all your prerequisites completed.
  • An asterisk ( * ) designates a required entry.
  1. Enter a connector name.
  2. Enter your Kafka Cluster credentials. The credentials are either the API key and secret or the service account API key and secret.
  3. Add your Salesforce connection details. Salesforce instance is not required. If not entered, this property defaults to https://login.salesforce.com. The connector uses the endpoint specified in the authentication response from Salesforce. All other fields are required to connect to Salesforce.
  4. Specify the initial starting point for the connector to use when replaying events. Use all to replay all events from last 72 hours. Use latest to replay only the events that arrive after the connector starts. This property defaults to latest.
  5. Add a Connection timeout in milliseconds. This is the amount of time to wait to connect to the Salesforce endpoint. The value defaults to 30000 (30 seconds).
  6. Select an Output message format (data coming from the connector): AVRO, JSON (schemaless), JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or PROTOBUF. A valid schema must be available in Schema Registry to use a schema-based message format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).
  7. Enter the number of tasks in use by the connector. Organizations can run multiple connectors with a limit of one task per connector (that is, "tasks.max": "1").

Note

See Configuration Properties for full configuration property descriptions.

Step 5: Launch the connector.

Verify the connection details by previewing the running configuration. Once you’ve validated that the properties are configured to your satisfaction, click Launch.

Tip

For information about previewing your connector output, see Connector Data Previews.

Step 6: Check the connector status.

The status for the connector should go from Provisioning to Running. It may take a few minutes.

Step 7: Check the Kafka topic.

After the connector is running, verify that messages are populating your Kafka topic.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect section.

For additional information about this connector, see Salesforce Platform Event Source Connector for Confluent Platform. Note that not all Confluent Platform connector features are provided in the Confluent Cloud connector.

See also

For an example that shows fully-managed Confluent Cloud connectors in action with Confluent Cloud ksqlDB, see the Cloud ETL Demo. This example also shows how to use Confluent Cloud CLI to manage your resources in Confluent Cloud.

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Using the Confluent Cloud CLI

Complete the following steps to set up and run the connector using the Confluent Cloud CLI.

Note

Make sure you have all your prerequisites completed.

Important

At least one topic must exist in your Confluent Cloud cluster before creating the connector.

Step 1: List the available connectors.

Enter the following command to list available connectors:

ccloud connector-catalog list

Step 2: Show the required connector configuration properties.

Enter the following command to show the required connector properties:

ccloud connector-catalog describe <connector-catalog-name>

For example:

ccloud connector-catalog describe SalesforcePlatformEventSource

Example output:

Following are the required configs:
connector.class: SalesforcePlatformEventSource
name
kafka.api.key
kafka.api.secret
kafka.topic
salesforce.username
salesforce.password
salesforce.password.token
salesforce.consumer.key
salesforce.consumer.secret
salesforce.platform.event.name
output.data.format
tasks.max

Step 3: Create the connector configuration file.

Create a JSON file that contains the connector configuration properties. The following example shows the required connector properties.

{
  "connector.class": "SalesforcePlatformEventSource",
  "name": "SalesforcePlatformEventSource_0",
  "kafka.api.key": "****************",
  "kafka.api.secret": "**********************************************",
  "kafka.topic": "TestPlatformEvent",
  "salesforce.username": "<my-username>",
  "salesforce.password": "**************",
  "salesforce.password.token": "************************",
  "salesforce.consumer.key": "******************************************",
  "salesforce.consumer.secret": "***************************************",
  "salesforce.platform.event.name": "TestEvent__e",
  "output.data.format": "JSON",
  "tasks.max": "1"
}

Note the following property definitions:

  • "connector.class": Identifies the connector plugin name.
  • "name": Sets a name for your new connector.
  • ""kafka.topic": Enter a Kafka topic name. A topic must exist before launching the connector.
  • "output.data.format": Sets the output message format (data coming from the connector). Valid entries are AVRO, JSON_SR, PROTOBUF, or JSON. You must have Confluent Cloud Schema Registry configured if using a schema-based message format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).
  • "tasks.max": Enter the number of tasks in use by the connector. Organizations can run multiple connectors with a limit of one task per connector (that is, "tasks.max": "1").

Note

See Configuration Properties for full configuration property descriptions.

Step 4: Load the properties file and create the connector.

Enter the following command to load the configuration and start the connector:

ccloud connector create --config <file-name>.json

For example:

ccloud connector create --config salesforce-platform-event-source.json

Example output:

Created connector SalesforcePlatformEventSource_0 lcc-aj3qr

Step 5: Check the connector status.

Enter the following command to check the connector status:

ccloud connector list

Example output:

ID          |            Name                  | Status  |  Type
+-----------+----------------------------------+---------+-------+
lcc-aj3qr   | SalesforcePlatformEventSource_0  | RUNNING | source

Step 6: Check the Kafka topic.

After the connector is running, verify that messages are populating your Kafka topic.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect section.

Configuration Properties

The unique properties used for this connector are defined below.

salesforce.instance

The URL of the Salesforce endpoint to use. This directs the connector to use the endpoint specified in the authentication response. If left blank, this defaults to https://login.salesforce.com.

  • Type: string
  • Default: https://login.salesforce.com
  • Valid Values: Valid URL with a scheme of https or http
  • Importance: high
salesforce.username

The Salesforce username the connector should use.

  • Type: string
  • Importance: high
salesforce.password

The Salesforce password the connector should use.

  • Type: password
  • Importance: high
salesforce.password.token

The Salesforce security token associated with the username.

  • Type: password
  • Importance: high
salesforce.consumer.key

The consumer key for the OAuth application.

  • Type: string
  • Importance: high
salesforce.consumer.secret

The consumer secret for the OAuth application.

  • Type: password
  • Importance: high
salesforce.initial.start

Specify the initial starting point for the connector for consuming events. Use all to consume all events from last 72 hours. Use latest to consume only events that arrive after the connector has started.

  • Type: string
  • Default: latest
  • Valid Values: all or latest
  • Importance: high
connection.timeout

The amount of time to wait while connecting to the Salesforce streaming endpoint.

  • Type: long
  • Default: 30000 (30 seconds)
  • Valid Values: [5000,…,600000]
  • Importance: low

Next Steps

See also

For an example that shows fully-managed Confluent Cloud connectors in action with Confluent Cloud ksqlDB, see the Cloud ETL Demo. This example also shows how to use Confluent Cloud CLI to manage your resources in Confluent Cloud.

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