Power BI Desktop hangs when adding a column

[pvarley]

I'm adding a column to an existing table. The table contains about 20,000 rows, so it should not take long, but after I hit Enter, Power BI Desktop says "Working on it" and never finishes. I have updated to the latest version and restarted my computer, but it still happens. I have to force the app to quit in Task Manager.

This is the definition of the column:

IsInternal = if( [Measure1] > 0 && [Measure2] = 0, TRUE(), FALSE() )

[vanessafvg]

how long have you waited? are you creating a column or a measure?  if you basing it off measures, should you not be creating a measure?

or alternatlively swap out true with 1, 0 for false or something and see if that makes any difference.

[pvarley]

I left it alone for about an hour, and it had finished when I returned. I am creating a column because I want to use it as a filter in reports. I don't believe I can do that with a measure because a measure would not have a row context. 

[v-shex-msft]

Hi @pvarley,

Can you share some detail content of your issue? It will be help for troubleshooting.(e.g. screenshots, formula, operate steps)

In addition, I'd like to suggest you use measure instead the calculate column and test again.

Regards,

Xiaoxin Sheng

[pvarley]

I created a measure with the same formula as the column, but Power BI will not allow me to use the measure as a filter in a report. That is why I'm using a calculated column.

The measures behind the column look like this:

Measure = CALCULATE( DISTINCTCOUNT( UsersTenants[Email] ),
FILTER( UsersTenants,
UsersTenants[Email] <> "specificuser@example.com" && FIND("@example.com", UsersTenants[Email], ,0) > 0
)
)

The UserTenants table has about 36,000 rows, and the Orgs table, which is related and has the column has about 19.000 rows, so it's not a lot of data. The column takes at least 20 minutes to calculate, which seems like an eternity for 19,000 rows. 

[v-shex-msft]

HI @pvarley,

I think the performanc issue is related to your masure, each measure will calculate throught the UsersTenants table. If this is a case, your calculate column will calculate about almost 1,368,000,000(19,000* 36,000*2) times.

Regards,

Xiaoxin Sheng

[pvarley · Accepted solution]

---

@v-shex-msft wrote:

HI @pvarley,

I think the performanc issue is related to your masure, each measure will calculate throught the UsersTenants table. If this is a case, your calculate column will calculate about almost 1,368,000,000(19,000* 36,000*2) times.

Regards,

Xiaoxin Sheng

---

That may be the problem. I worked around it by moving the string comparison into the query and generating two new columns in the UsersTenants table with True/False values. Now the measures just look at those two values, and the calculation is much faster. The new measures look like this:

CALCULATE( DISTINCTCOUNT( UsersTenants[Email] ),
FILTER( UsersTenants,
UsersTenants[IsProvisioningUser] = FALSE && UsersTenants[IsInternalUser] = TRUE
)
)