Azure SQL Database

Datafly Signal writes first-party events into an Azure SQL Database table over the SQL Server wire protocol, with TLS encryption required.

Why route Azure SQL through Datafly Signal

• The data lands in infrastructure you own. Signal writes to your Azure SQL directly from your own deployment. Datafly operates no intermediary and never holds a copy of your event data.
• Personal data is hashed on the way in. Email, phone (shaped to E.164 first), first, last and full name and postcode are normalised (trimmed and lower-cased) and hashed with SHA-256 inside your own deployment, so the table holds email_sha256, phone_sha256 and the other digests rather than the raw values. Storing a raw value is a deliberate edit to the installed blueprint.
• Only what the blueprint maps is stored. The properties Signal writes are exactly the fields the blueprint maps. Identify traits and client properties the blueprint does not map are never written, so a stray email in an event property cannot land in Azure SQL in plain text.
• Presets for Retail, Insurance, Travel, Media & Streaming, B2B / SaaS, Automotive and General. Each vertical preset names one field per property in the matching event spec, with canonical names (transaction_id, value, items), legacy aliases (order_id, revenue, products) read automatically, numbers typed as numbers and currency codes upper-cased.
• Client IP and user agent are recorded as event context. Both come from the original visitor request rather than from your server, so geography and device analysis done in the warehouse reflects the actual visitor.
• One consent decision governs every destination. Azure SQL is gated by the same consent state as the rest of your stack, so a withdrawal applies everywhere at once.

Prerequisites

Before configuring Azure SQL Database in Signal, you need an Azure account with an Azure SQL server, a database, a target table, and firewall rules configured to allow Signal access.

CREATE TABLE dbo.events (
  message_id      NVARCHAR(64)   NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY,
  event_type      NVARCHAR(32)   NOT NULL,
  event_name      NVARCHAR(255),
  anonymous_id    NVARCHAR(128),
  user_id         NVARCHAR(255),
  ip_address      NVARCHAR(45),
  user_agent      NVARCHAR(MAX),
  page_url        NVARCHAR(MAX),
  page_path       NVARCHAR(MAX),
  page_referrer   NVARCHAR(MAX),
  org_id          NVARCHAR(64),
  pipeline_id     NVARCHAR(64),
  event_timestamp DATETIMEOFFSET,
  received_at     DATETIMEOFFSET,
  properties_json NVARCHAR(MAX) CHECK (ISJSON(properties_json) = 1),
  context_json    NVARCHAR(MAX) CHECK (ISJSON(context_json) = 1)
);
 
CREATE INDEX IX_events_ts ON dbo.events (event_timestamp DESC);

CREATE LOGIN datafly_signal WITH PASSWORD = 'your_secure_password';
CREATE USER datafly_signal FOR LOGIN datafly_signal;
GRANT INSERT ON dbo.events TO datafly_signal;
GRANT SELECT ON dbo.events (message_id) TO datafly_signal;

Configuration

Signal Setup

Quick Setup

1. Navigate to Integrations in the sidebar.
2. Open the Integration Library tab.
3. Find Azure SQL Database or filter by Database.
4. Click Install, select a variant if available, and fill in the required fields.
5. Click Install Integration to create the integration with a ready-to-use default blueprint.

API Setup

curl -X POST http://localhost:8084/v1/admin/integration-catalog/azure_sql/install \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "name": "Azure SQL Database",
    "variant": "default",
    "config": {
      "server": "datafly-sql.database.windows.net",
      "port": "1433",
      "database": "analytics",
      "schema_name": "dbo",
      "table_name": "events",
      "username": "datafly_signal",
      "password": "your_secure_password",
      "encrypt": "true"
    },
    "delivery_mode": "server_side"
  }'

Schema

Signal inserts one row per event into exactly these sixteen columns, so the table must have them all (extra columns of your own are fine if they are nullable or have defaults):

Signal inserts with IF NOT EXISTS (SELECT 1 ... WHERE message_id = @p1) INSERT ..., so a redelivered event is skipped; index message_id (the primary key above). A value too long for an NVARCHAR(n) column fails the insert. The JSON columns are NVARCHAR(MAX) with an ISJSON check, queried with JSON_VALUE and OPENJSON. Azure SQL Database also has a native json type; Signal’s inserts were verified against NVARCHAR(MAX) only.

What the properties hold

The blueprint decides what properties_json contains, and only mapped fields are written (identify traits and unmapped client properties never are):

• The event’s own fields from the preset sit at the top level, for example transaction_id, value, currency, items, insurance_type or policy_term_months.
• The preset’s global block sits under @root: copies of the envelope (event_name, event_type, user_id, anonymous_id, event_id, message_id, event_timestamp, page_url, page_referrer, ip_address, user_agent, locale, timezone, source_id), utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign, the consent flags consent_analytics and consent_marketing, and the hashed identity email_sha256, phone_sha256, first_name_sha256, last_name_sha256, name_sha256.
• identify adds name_sha256 and postal_code_sha256 at the top level.
• An event the preset does not list stores its envelope and the @root block only.

For example, the purchases with their order ID, value and hashed email:

SELECT TOP 10 event_timestamp,
       JSON_VALUE(properties_json, '$.transaction_id')         AS transaction_id,
       CAST(JSON_VALUE(properties_json, '$.value') AS DECIMAL(12,2)) AS value,
       JSON_VALUE(properties_json, '$.currency')               AS currency,
       JSON_VALUE(properties_json, '$."@root".email_sha256')   AS email_sha256
FROM dbo.events
WHERE event_name = 'purchase'
ORDER BY event_timestamp DESC;

Signal does not write mapped fields to their own columns; create views over properties_json for the fields you query often. What else a row carries outside the blueprint (the whole event context) is under review in #1414.

Stored event context

Alongside the fields your blueprint maps (where email, phone, names and address are stored as normalised SHA-256 by default), each row carries the event’s collected context exactly as Signal received it. The blueprint does not filter or hash the context: this is deliberate (decision 2026-09-23), so the context is complete for attribution, fraud and debugging queries, and it is listed here so you can decide what to keep.

They are written to the ip_address, user_agent, page_url, page_path and page_referrer columns and, in full, to the context_json column, beside anonymous_id and user_id. Click and collected IDs outside the context are stored only where the blueprint maps them.

The IP address, device and advertising IDs, and cookie and click identifiers are personal data under UK and EU GDPR. To keep any of them out of storage, strip, mask or hash the field for every integration with the organisation data layer, apply URL redaction to page URLs, or remove it in the installed blueprint; and set the storage’s retention to match your privacy notice. See Personal data by integration.

Consent

Azure SQL is a first-party destination under your control, gated by the same consent state as every other destination. Each stored event also records the visitor’s consent at collection time: the preset writes consent_analytics and consent_marketing under @root in the properties (properties_json), and the full consent object is in the context. Use them in views or queries if your governance needs a per-row consent filter.

Testing

1. Enable the integration in Signal and trigger a test event on your website.
2. Connect to the Azure SQL database and query the target table:

SELECT TOP 10 message_id, event_type, event_name, event_timestamp
FROM dbo.events
ORDER BY event_timestamp DESC;

3. Verify that event rows are appearing with correct data.
4. In Signal, check the Live Events view to confirm delivery status shows as successful.

Troubleshooting

See also

• Azure Synapse Analytics
• Azure Cosmos DB
• Azure Blob Storage
• PostgreSQL