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Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
Not applicable
5 years ago
Solved

Populating empty tables with data

Hello,   I created a data model with empty tables in the hope of populating them with data once data becomes available. I've been trying to find ways to do that but have not been able to find that....
Need Help
  • v-jingzhang's avatar
    v-jingzhang
    5 years ago

    Hi Anonymous 

    I don’t recommend you to create the empty table with functions in Power BI because it will be difficult to replace the data. Instead, I recommend that you create the empty table outside power BI using the same data source type with your BigQuery table if it is possible. In this way, you can use this empty table (in which there is some sample data) to create the data model and reports. When you want to connect the report to the BigQuery table, you can change the data source easily in Data source settings. The data from the new data source will then be used in your report after applied.

     

    If it is not convenient for you to create an empty table with the same data source type as BigQuery table, you can also create it with another type, e.g. an Excel Workbook. Remember to build the same table structure in the excel file and connect to this excel file in Power BI to create your model. When the real data is ready, you can create a new query connecting to the BigQuery table source, then go to Query Editor->Advanced Editor, copy the Source and paste it in your original empty table query’s Advanced Editor to replace its Source. At last, you can delete the new query created in previous step.

     

    For more details and examples, you can refer to these links:

    https://blog.decisivedata.net/blog/change-a-power-bi-data-source-type

    https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Desktop/Change-excel-datasource-to-Web-sharepoint-file/td-p/330296

    https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Desktop/Change-of-data-source-from-excel-to-sharepoint/td-p/515417

     

    Best Regards,

    Community Support Team _ Jing Zhang

    If this post helps, please consider Accept it as the solution to help other members find it.

darentengmfs's avatar
darentengmfs
Post Prodigy
5 years ago

Anonymous 

 

If that's the case, you can change your source of your query under Advance Editor. Change it to whatever is used to pull your data. The rest of the steps will be applied in the same table.

Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
Not applicable
5 years ago

Hi darentengmfs,

 

Thanks for the tip. I don't see the table I created in Advance Editor. I think it's because I created the empty table using DATATABLE function. Is that true?

 

I first created a table using the following code:

ap_leads = DATATABLE(
"mac_code",STRING,
"mac_description",STRING,
{
{"A123","Test MAC"}
}
)
 
Then, I tried to Transform data and in my Queries list, I didn't see "ap_leads".
 
It seems like there is no way but to have two queries for each table that will be in the data model; the first query being the empty tables, the second query being the actual data source.
  • darentengmfs's avatar
    darentengmfs
    Post Prodigy
    5 years ago

    Anonymous 

     

    You are right, if you create a table using functions and formulas, it will not appear in Power Query mode.

    • Anonymous's avatar
      Anonymous
      Not applicable
      5 years ago

      darentengmfs 

      Should I be concerned with having twice as many queries as needed? I guess what are the areas this will have an impact on, besides having a messy list of queries.

      • darentengmfs's avatar
        darentengmfs
        Post Prodigy
        5 years ago

        Anonymous 

         

        I need to get this clear.

         

        You have an empty table with a list of steps. You are then importing a dataset into your model and want the new dataset to have the list of steps, just like the one in the empty table?