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Anonymous
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4 years ago
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Different Datatype under same Column

I was hoping someone could help me out. i have a dataset in excel where a column has multiple datatype, like currency, text, decimals and %. Is there a way those datatype can remian as is in power BI...
  • Tutu_in_YYC's avatar
    4 years ago

    Hi RilwanFlame,

    There is no way a column can have multiple data type. If it is a mix, it will usually end up a Text as data type.

    But you can hack it using DAX by adding switch statements for different cases where you need different units, and you have to hard code them.

    Check this example:


    And this is the measure:

     

    SWITCH = 

    VAR A = SELECTEDVALUE('Sales Territories'[Country])
    RETURN

    SWITCH(
    TRUE(),
    SELECTEDVALUE('Sales Territories'[Country]) = "Canada", [Percentage] * 100 & "%",
    SELECTEDVALUE('Sales Territories'[Country]) = "Australia", "$" & [Total Sales]
    )

     

    If you want to do this, you need to separate your column with mixed data types into multiple columns with different types, or else you cannot aggregate the columns to create a measure.