Forum Discussion

Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
Not applicable
6 years ago

Power BI Desktop port changes everytime

Hi All,   We are trying to open port from a server (behind the firewall) to Power BI desktop installed on my local machine. I see that the port number is not static and changes for every pbi file. ...
Need Help
  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    Not applicable
    6 years ago

    Hi Maggie,

     

    Thanks for your response. I know how to retrieve the port but my question was regarding the behavior of it. The ports are different for each PBI file opened in my PBI desktop so I wanted to know if there is a way to get a static port number for my local PBI desktop so we can open the connections from our server behind the firewall.

     

    Thanks in advance

    • v-juanli-msft's avatar
      v-juanli-msft
      Community Support
      6 years ago

      Hi Anonymous 

      Do you install any SSAS instance  on your machine?

      I would suggest you installing a SSAS instance  on your machine.

      I find a useful blog, this statement could explain why you see different port each time.

       

      Power BI Desktop uses xVelocity technology and loads data into memory. It uses a local instance of SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS). It does the job by running msmdsrv.exe file which can be found in “bin” folder under your Power BI Desktop installation folder which is normally under you Program Files. The msmdsrv.exe is indeed the SSAS service file. So even if you haven’t installed SSAS on your machine Power BI Desktop runs msmdsrv.exe. When Power BI Desktop runs msmdsrv.exe it creates a local instance of SSAS. This local SSAS instance uses a random port number so it would be valid until Power BI Desktop is not closed or the msmdsrv.exe is not killed from Task Manager.

       

      Best Regards
      Maggie
      Community Support Team _ Maggie Li
      If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.
    • v-juanli-msft's avatar
      v-juanli-msft
      Community Support
      6 years ago

      Hi Anonymous 

      Is this problem sloved? 
      If it is sloved, could you kindly accept it as a solution to close this case?
      If not, please let me know.
       
      Best Regards
      Maggie
      • ChrisPa's avatar
        ChrisPa
        New Member
        6 years ago

        Hi Maggie,

        The issue is not how to find the port but its random character. I have a similar issue when exporting data from the local instance of PBi Desktop to Excel. Every time i open the report, the port change then i have to get the new one then to re-establish my connexions into Excel in order to refresh the data.

        I can live with that but having the same port everytime would save some time...

        Is there a method to have the same port every time ?

        Thank you in advance,

        Best regards

        Chris