DirectQuery not ready?

[tempranello]

Hi there

I reckon that Power BI looks like it'll be great some day, particularly with DirectQuery alleviating the need to drag in huge amounts of data.  However DirectQuery looks like a bit of a dud right now, or is it just me?

I can easily build SQL queries to hit a database - great!  If I want to hit another database on the same server, then I'm told that I must flip ALL queries to Import.  That's really unhelpful.

Perhaps if I create an Excel workbook that queries that other DB and I just import it into my Power BI, maybe that will be a workaround?  No, again, if I try to point at the workbook I'm told that again ALL of my queries must be set to Import.

I wanted to replace my large Excel workbook with a Power BI equivalent.  It's large because it imports everything I point it at (3 or 4 DBs and a few other workbooks).  I looked to Power BI to alleviate the need to import from the DBs, but apparently it's not possible if you want to mix your sources as I've described above.

A shame really.

[greggyb]

Is there any reason you cannot combine these databases in a data warehouse?

There are some things that better tools can fix or alleviate. I've yet to see a tool that obviates the need for putting proper BI infrastructure fundamentals in place, like a DW.