Power BI Desktop is primarily designed for data modeling and report creation, and it doesn't support scheduled data refresh from local files or folders like Power BI Service does. To automate the process of refreshing data from local CSV files, you would need to publish your report to the Power BI Service, where you can set up scheduled data refresh as I explained in the previous response.
However, if you need a solution that works directly from Power BI Desktop, you can consider using a workaround by leveraging Power Query in Power BI Desktop to automate the process of importing new data from local CSV files. Here's how you can do it:
1. Create a Parameter for File Path:
- In Power BI Desktop, go to the "Home" tab, click on "Manage Parameters."
- Create a parameter that allows you to specify the folder path where your CSV files are located. You can make this parameter dynamic by using a relative folder path or by using a query parameter.
2. Create a Query for File Listing:
- Create a new query that retrieves a list of files from the specified folder using the parameter you created in step 1. You can use the `Folder.Files` function in Power Query to do this. This query will dynamically list the files in the folder.
3. Filter and Transform Data:
- Create another query that filters and transforms the data from the CSV files listed in the previous step. You can loop through the list of files and apply the same transformations to each file.
4. Combine and Load Data:
- Combine the data from all the CSV files into one table. You can use the "Append Queries" feature in Power Query to achieve this.
5. Set Refresh Options:
- In Power BI Desktop, go to "File" > "Options and settings" > "Options."
- In the "Options" dialog, go to "Query Options" and set "Background Data" to refresh the data automatically in the background.
6. Schedule Refresh (Manual):
- Although you won't have a scheduled refresh option like in Power BI Service, you can still manually refresh your data in Power BI Desktop by clicking the "Refresh" button.
Please note that this approach is not fully automated like the scheduled refresh in Power BI Service, and you'll need to refresh the data manually whenever you want to update it. It's a workaround for achieving data refresh from local files within Power BI Desktop. For fully automated scheduled refresh, you should consider using Power BI Service as explained in the previous response.
