Date-less Data

[jason-burdetts]

I am a new user to Power BI, although a long time developer and IT person generally. I mention this to provide some context as I may use words familiar to me but may need to be translated to Power BI-ese.

I am currently importing data from a REST API into a table. The data set does not contain any dates, however each result does have "current state" values (e.g. kilometres travelled) that change over time. How do I set up a data flow (which is what I think I need) to basically say "when I import a result, add on the current datetime to each entry."

The idea is to be able to track change over time where the data does not explicitly give a time metric. Ideally, each import would append to the existing data set, not replace it. If there is a more specific language to describe this in PowerBI world, please let me know.

Thank you kindly!

Jason

[jason-burdetts]

Thank you for the response. I was beginning to suspect that, but it does make perfect sense. I'll find another solution for the data collection itself. Coming from a SQL background I was assuming that pulling something into tables meant ACTUAL tables.

[lbendlin · Accepted solution]

Save the results of your REST API calls into JSON files on a file share (for example a SharePoint).  Then use the File create date as your timestamp.

Do not attempt to use Power BI for data storage. Bad things will happen. Power BI is a reporting tool, it has no memory.