DAX, Recursion, and UDFs :(

[WishAskedSooner]

I have been fighting internal forces in my organization that hate PowerBI in preference to open  source solutions. Well, last week it finally happened. I lost. Why?

Well, we are trying to implement a business requirement that requires full recursion. After doing some due diligence on my end, I confirmed that DAX is a declarative language not capable of full recursion, and when I informed our management, the pitchforks were out.

Now, let me clear. I am well aware that Excel complains loudly when there are circular calcs, and I vividly recall the the old Macro 4.0 days. However, I doubt there is a single corporate entity that is not using a VBA-powered workbook. It even had from the beginning an early form of AI with the Record button.

What I can't understand is why Microsoft refuses to include the ability to call user-defined-functions in DAX. Sure performance may suffer, but that is on the developer, not Microsoft. I don't even care what language they use: VBA, Python, C#. It doesn't matter.

And don't tell me that I need to vote on the idea. Did Microsoft do some sort of petition before deciding to implement VBA into Excel making it possibly the single best productivity application on the planet?

The world is moving fast, and Microsoft seems asleep at the wheel and inexplicably focused on Fabric versus making PowerBI a full-featured, truly powerful app.

[v-echaithra]

Hi @WishAskedSooner ,

As we haven’t heard back from you, we wanted to kindly follow up to check if the solution provided for the issue worked? or Let us know if you need any further assistance?
If our response addressed, please mark it as Accept as solution and click Yes if you found it helpful.

Regards,
Chaithra.

[v-echaithra]

Hi @WishAskedSooner ,

May I ask if you have gotten this issue resolved?

If it is solved, please mark the helpful reply or share your solution and accept it as solution, it will be helpful for other members of the community who have similar problems as yours to solve it faster.

Regards,

Chaithra E.

[v-echaithra]

Hi @WishAskedSooner ,

As we haven’t heard back from you, we wanted to kindly follow up to check if the solution provided for the issue worked? or Let us know if you need any further assistance?
If our response addressed, please mark it as Accept as solution and click Yes if you found it helpful.

Regards,

Chaithra.

[Deku · Accepted solution]

If this is important to you please create a fabric idea or vote on a exiting one, and it will be considered by the development team

https://community.fabric.microsoft.com/t5/Fabric-Ideas/ct-p/fbc_ideas

[WishAskedSooner]

The more I think about this, the more I come to conclude that the ONLY reason PowerBI has so many users is because it comes bundled with the Office Suite. Of course, that doesn't make it a great application, just convenient.