Forum Discussion
Formula.Firewall: Query references other queries, so it may not directly access a data source.
- 10 years ago
Ken Puls blogged about this here
http://www.excelguru.ca/blog/2015/03/11/power-query-errors-please-rebuild-this-data-combination/
After a couple hours I found a workaround for the problem I was having but it really just confirms what I already think about M.
I found that the problem I was having was NOT down to accesing an external data source (all of my data loads are done in functions) but because I load a table, create two filtered tables from that table and then join them together. Why it would object to that I don't know, but it does ... I suspect (as per my previous post) that it's something to do with the lazy interpretation and it getting confused!
I then moved the splitting and re-joining of the table into a function script and it worked!
I think M / Power Query is a fantastic tool but it needs so many improvements ...
1. Ability to save files from within the Power Query environment ... qiute a few times Excel has hung/crashed when exiting the environment and I have lost hours of work!
2. Ability to export all scripts to text files in a specifed folder.
Would be nice ...
1. The Advanced Editor name is a bit of a joke as it anything but!. Colour-coding and all of that would be nice BUT for starters how about some basic Notepad-style editing features such as Search and Replace?
2. I really wish I could change the editor font size as it is too small, I don't want to have to change all of Window settings just because of this.
3. Environment state. It would be nice if the opened/closed groups stayed opened/closed in Power Query and the Excel sidebar, I constantly have to close the groups I'm not interested in.
So, regarding editing of Power Query, I just found out that there's an addon for Power Query in Visual Studio (via Adam Saxton), and just started using it. He also mentioned that there's one for Visual Studio Code as well.