Forum Discussion
Connecting to Xero data from Desktop application?
Hi,
I am new and now evaluating the xero and powerBI as my selection for my new Accounting and Reporting System.
I wondering and not saw XERO in "get data" selection for powerBI Desktop, thats meant powerBI Desktop is not able to connect to XERO directly? Or we need to have powerBI Pro to do that?
- karaoan
Kudo Kingpin
jllau84 There is no data source in Power BI for Xero. There is only an app which only supports one entity and it can't be edited in Power Desktop. For consolidations and to use all the features in the Desktop you will need a solution like https://www.acterys.com.
hi karaoan, i not understand with "There is only an app which only supports one entity and it can't be edited in Power Desktop." That's mean will be only some "build-in report" for xero that is not editable?
clearjelly is free apps or need to pay?
How about powerBI Pro and Premium? can connect to XERO directly?
- karaoan
hi jllau84 the Xero app only works from the Power BI Service and can't be edited in Power BI Desktop. You have limited editing options on the Power BI service but for example can't add all the other sources to the report that you normally have in the Desktop. Acterys is a paid service at a reasonably price of $49 per entity (with quantity discounts for advisors and entities >10). The app works with either Power BI Pro or Premium in the same way as described above.
Martin
Planning With Power BI -> https://www.acterys.com
- ElizabethTachji
Helper III
Hi,
Power BI desktop can connect to Xero directly however you need a couple add ons. I provide a service to business, to connect Power BI desktop to Xero and develop bespoke business insights. If interested send me an e-mail [email protected].
Cheers
Elizabeth Tachjian.
- karaoan
Even if a direct API access from Power BI Desktop is possible, it is typically not a great idea as:
1. You will always be at the mercy of "allowed API calls per day" limitations.
2. There are often issues with multi entity (consolidation) access.
3. Access via the API will not provide a proper data warehouse/star schema which means that working with it will be slow, have a limited user experiene and will always require additional work on the front end side.
All these problems are already apparent when you use the QuickBooks direct access connector in Power BI Desktop that uses the Quickbooks API.
Feel free to contact me, for further questions on this.
Martin
Planning With Power BI -> https://www.acterys.com
samdthompsonMemorable Member
Hello jllau84. I am not a consultant so....ya know.
Anyway, couple of questions.
1. What are you expecting the reporting to do for you?
2. Are you trying to generate reports for a really big organisation or a small one?
3. How many transactions are you expecting to come through each week?
4. Do you need near real time processing or is it a case of needing to see transactions up to say yesterday?
5. Does it need to be fully automated or would it be okay to have an extract run?
PowerBi is an incredibly powerful platform but still in its infancy so not all things are yet catered for eg a Xero connector on desktop. In saying that a monthly update cycle is pretty good and so many of these issues go away quite swiftly if there are enough users voices backing the idea.
There are a couple of ideas I can think of and seen implemented that i can share if you can give me an idea of what you are after.
Cheers,
SamHi Sam,
1. What are you expecting the reporting to do for you?
- Able to generate Financial Report, Budget Report, Forecasting Report etc.... Maybe link to HR data for HR Report etc.
2. Are you trying to generate reports for a really big organisation or a small one?
- We are concrete supplier, we might need to generate the sales report and other internal report.
3. How many transactions are you expecting to come through each week?
- for sales, normally 400 to 500 line but may be higher than that.
4. Do you need near real time processing or is it a case of needing to see transactions up to say yesterday?
- yes, for management planning, material planning and sales forecast.
5. Does it need to be fully automated or would it be okay to have an extract run?
- depend on the complexity of the extract task, if got automated will use automated method.
- samdthompson
jllau84 I am not a particularly high user of zero - i try to keep out of the way of accountants - so you will need to excuse my ignorance with some of my responses.
1. The volume of transactions is not a problem. Thats easily within the limits of API calls so not a problem.
2. Linking to other systems will require multiple tables - at least one for each system and then for good practice a date table at the very least. That cannot be done in PBI service. It does not allow the relationship creation.
3. If by realtime info you are talking about an order comes in, is entered into the system and the say mix quatities are updated and reported on immediately then PBI wont be a solution for you at the moment.
with a whole bunch more investment into say pubnub connectors or an overly complicated system where you have data extracted on PBI servcie then connected as a data source in excel then published back up to PBI service while being mashed up with other sources, it could be achieved. But that sounds a bit too hard does it not?
I suspect from the volume of transactions you are looking for a solution which is out of the box and will (we all know that never actually happens) just work without a whole bunch of dedicated IT time.
I would love to say use powerbi because i genuinely like using it and reccomending it, but in this case i dont see that its a good solution for you at the moment. If you were able to wait 24 months it would be virtually guaranteed to be an out of the box fit.
Cheers,
Sam
