Tulip Connections

A Tulip connection reads data from a specific table in your Tulip instance. You can select which fields to include, apply filters, and configure caching for faster repeated reads.

Setting up a Tulip connection

1. Go to Data Connections and click New Connection.
2. Select Tulip as the connection type.
3. Choose a data source config (the Tulip instance to connect to).
4. Select a table from the dropdown. Tables are loaded from your Tulip instance.
5. Choose which fields to include. You can select all or pick specific columns.
6. Give the connection a name — this is what you'll use in getData("name") in widget code.
7. Click Save.

Field selection

By default, a Tulip connection returns all fields from the table. You can narrow this to specific fields, which:

• Reduces the data transferred on each fetch
• Keeps widget code simpler by only exposing relevant columns

Each field shows its name, label, and data type.

Filters

Filters let you restrict which records the connection returns. You can add one or more filters, each with:

• Field — Which column to filter on
• Function — The comparison type (equals, not equals, greater than, less than, contains, starts with, is blank, etc.)
• Value — The value to compare against

When you have multiple filters, choose an aggregation mode:

• All (AND) — Records must match every filter
• Any (OR) — Records must match at least one filter

Caching

Tulip connections support caching to reduce load on the Tulip API and speed up widget rendering. Cache settings include:

Setting	Description	Default
Delta refresh interval	How often to check for new or updated records (incremental sync)	5 minutes
Full rebuild interval	How often to do a complete re-fetch of all records (catches deletes)	48 hours
Cache window	Only cache records from this time window (optional)	No limit

Caching is optional. If disabled, every getData() call fetches fresh data from Tulip.

How caching works

• Delta sync fetches only records updated since the last sync. This is fast and lightweight.
• Full rebuild re-fetches every record to detect deletions that delta sync can't catch.
• If filters are configured, delta sync fetches without filters (to detect records that stopped matching), then applies filters client-side.

Notes

• Field labels from Tulip (the human-readable names) are used as column keys in the data returned to widgets, not the internal Tulip field IDs.
• If your admin has set up multiple Tulip data source configs, make sure you select the correct one when creating the connection.
• Changes to the Tulip table structure (new columns, renamed fields) may require updating the connection's field selection.