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Daan_vanRiel's avatar
Daan_vanRiel
Regular Visitor
17 hours ago

Fabric Data Agent error user, help!

Hi everyone,

I've created and published a Fabric data agent connected to a Power BI semantic model.

My fellow developers and I can successfully ask questions in both Fabric and Microsoft 365 Copilot. However, one test user consistently receives an error in both environments, using the same questions that work for us.

In Fabric, the error is: "An error occurred. Please try again or ask a new question below."

Expanding the response only shows the same message. In M365 Copilot, the agent reports that the data service is unavailable and it cannot access the underlying dataset.

We have confirmed that the published agent is shared with him and that he can open it. He has Read permission on the underlying semantic model, his RLS access is configured, and he can view data in existing reports connected to that exact model. His account is also allowed to use Fabric Copilot.

The relevant differences are that he has no workspace role in the workspace hosting the agent and only has Read access, while the developers have broader permissions.

According to the following documentation, Read permission on the semantic model should be sufficient, and workspace access should not be required for interaction through a data agent: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/fabric/data-science/data-agent-sharing

Is an additional permission or setting required for users accessing a published agent through item-level sharing? Are there any known issues with this scenario?

Where can we retrieve a more detailed error or correlation ID? The current message does not explain which part of the request is failing.

Thanks!

Need Help

1 Reply

  • Murtaza_Ghafoor's avatar
    Murtaza_Ghafoor
    Icon for Super User rankSuper User
    13 hours ago

    Daan_vanRiel​ 

    Per Microsoft's docs, Read access on the underlying Power BI semantic model should be enough for a user to work with a Fabric Data Agent — workspace access isn't a stated requirement. Since this user can already open the semantic model and its reports, and RLS is behaving correctly for them, I don't think we're looking at a basic model-permission gap.

    So before touching anything permanent, here's the plan:

    1. Don't jump to granting Workspace Viewer. If we do add it and that resolves the issue, that's useful diagnostic signal — it'd point to an item-level access problem rather than a semantic-model one. But it should be a test, not a fix we leave in place.
    2. Reproduce it in Fabric directly first. Have the user ask a simple question there, outside of Copilot. If it fails in Fabric too, we know this isn't a Microsoft 365 Copilot-specific problem.
    3. Republish the Data Agent once we've confirmed the semantic model and agent config are up to date — just to rule out a stale publish.
    4. Pull the Data Agent's diagnostics/run details to see exactly where it's failing: auth, semantic model access, query generation, DAX execution, or RLS.
    5. Check Fabric capacity and service health around the exact time of failure, in case it's environmental rather than permissions-related.
    6. Log the details so we have them ready for Microsoft Support if needed: timestamp, user UPN, Data Agent ID, semantic model ID, the exact question asked, and any Request/Activity/Correlation ID.

    Bottom line: the user's setup looks correct per Microsoft's documented model. The right next step is controlled diagnostic testing — not assuming Workspace Viewer is a required fix.

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