Skip to main content
cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Learn from the best! Meet the four finalists headed to the FINALS of the Power BI Dataviz World Championships! Register now

Reply
Anonymous
Not applicable

R Custom Visual - using data from R script (not importing from Power BI)

I was following this tutorial: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/developer/visuals/funnel-plot-from-r

My impression was that "dataset.csv" file was read in with "read.csv" function in the R script which was used for the plot. But when I import the visual to Power BI it asks me to import the CSV file in Power BI.

As a simpler example, with the template code given here:

g = qplot(`Petal.Length`, data = iris, fill = `Species`, main = Sys.time());

I thought it was going to use the "iris" dataset when imported but it again asks me to import a source dataset.

My intention is to read in the data in R script (e.g. from web) to use them for the plots, without again importing the data in Power BI.

Would this be possible? Any help would be appreciated!

3 REPLIES 3
lbendlin
Super User
Super User

Yes. Use a different tool instead of Power BI.

lbendlin
Super User
Super User

Have you changed this line 

dataset = read.csv(file = "dataset.csv", header = TRUE, sep = ",", stringsAsFactors = FALSE)

to point to a web based data file instead?

Anonymous
Not applicable

Thanks @lbendlin , I've tried and it works. Only one caveat is that I still need to supply any data to get it working (even if it's nothing to do with the data for plotting). Looks like this is the best I can? I wonder if there's any way to omit the step of putting the data itself in Power BI? Thank you!

Helpful resources

Announcements
Power BI DataViz World Championships carousel

Power BI DataViz World Championships - June 2026

A new Power BI DataViz World Championship is coming this June! Don't miss out on submitting your entry.

Join our Fabric User Panel

Join our Fabric User Panel

Share feedback directly with Fabric product managers, participate in targeted research studies and influence the Fabric roadmap.

March Power BI Update Carousel

Power BI Community Update - March 2026

Check out the March 2026 Power BI update to learn about new features.

Top Solution Authors
Top Kudoed Authors