Power BI dashboards have stopped displaying images from an 'http' url

[kenmuir71]

Hi

I have dashboards which are pubished online. For years we have used the visual 'Simple Image' which diaplays images. The images are using a url such as 'http://12.34.56.78/Images/1234.jpg'. These were working fine until last week. They have now stopped displaying.

The urls are still correct, I have tried different visuals but no images appear. Can anybody help? I presume it must have been a recent Power BI update that is affecting the visual.

Thanks

[kenmuir71]

Thanks for the suggestion, I have tested with an https url and the image visual works. However my images are http: and cannot be changed. The problem started about 4 weeks ago. Has there been any updates to Power BI which prvents http: images urls from displaying?

[Pragati11]

Hi @kenmuir71 ,

I can't fins about any such update that has been made to Power BI Desktop.

On the official Microsoft blog, there are some things they have mentioned one should consider with image URLs. May be worth chekcing that in your case:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/create-reports/power-bi-images-tables#considerations

[kenmuir71]

I'm afraid this does not answer my question. The data and visual worked for a few years and stopped 4 weeks ago. The images are HTTP, I believe this is why they now do not work as HTTPS images do. Nothing at all has changed, the URL addresses, the data type, the power BI reports, the Visual. I can only think that the reason it now does not work on all my reports is that ther has been a Power BI update.

[Pragati11]

HI @kenmuir71 ,

I would suggest raising it with Microsoft team then:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/support/

[Pragati11]

Hi @kenmuir71 ,

Few questions:

1. where are these images stored?
2. Is the link url that you shared in your description above a genuine link for the image? If yes, I am not able to see any image when clicking on this url: http://12.34.56.78/Images/1234.jpg
3. What is the data category of the column with these image URLs defined in your Power BI report? 

[kenmuir71]

Hi Pragati

No the link is not real, I have used fake data so you can see the format of the url. The data type stored in Power Bi for the image column containing these URLs is Text, with format as Text. Please note the image links are working. Also the images used to work on my dashboards, they have recently stopped working. We have made no changes to the urls or the data within Power BI.

[Pragati11]

Hi @kenmuir71 ,

Thanks for your response.

Can you try chnaging the data category of the URL column to Image URL and then  check if the images come back again on your visual?

Also I understand that Simple Image is a third-party custom visual. So if anything has broke on that side, then it can be a issue with the visual itself.

Can you try my above suggestion and see if that fixes the images? Also after changing the data category to Image URL try if the images are displayed say in a table visual.

[kenmuir71]

I have changed the data category to 'Image URL' and 'Web URL'. Neither work. I have also trie dto display in standard visuals (Card, Table). These do not work either. It is strange as we have not change dthe data or dahsboards or the urls. They just stopped working.

[Pragati11]

HI @kenmuir71 ,

This seems very strange as I don't see issue with image urls on my side, if I want to display them in the simple image visual.

See my IMAGE column has got the following values:

The data category of the Image column is set to Image URL:

I downloaded the Simple Image custom visual and it diaplays the image as follows:

Even in the table visual, the images are displayed for me:

One difference what I see in your image URL values when compared to mine is:

The Image URL values in my date start with "https://" when compared to your's that start with "http://".

May be this is creating the issues.

Try raising it with Microsoft if "http://" used to work before and stopped working now.