Forum Discussion
Query Folding Icons in Power Query
Unfortuntely, the indicators are only for Power Query Online meaning you won't see it in Power BI Desktop's Power Query Editor.
Hello jakaihammuda ,
it's called Data flows.
check it out here https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/transform-model/dataflows/dataflows-create
For import mode, when the report is refreshed PBI will query the DB with the native query that you see and if the query fold breaks after that, will apply the rest of the steps it needs after it brings the data in.
You can test this yourself, if you check the steps after each transformation.
This step is the navigation to the table.
If I want to take out some columns, the next step will show the query that it will run on refresh. In Power BI its a remove columns step but instead of getting everything and then deleting all the additional columns, it just simplifies the sql query.
Similarly, if I want only 2020 data and filter in Power BI - It folds all those steps into 1 query that will execute when refreshed. Which means less load that Power Query has to do!
This is incredibly helpful, thank you.
When you say " if the query fold breaks after that, will apply the rest of the steps it needs after it brings the data in" how will the query fold break as such? Because all the native queries are rolled into one and then sent back, how can it "break". or do you just mean the first step after the last native query step will be the "break"?
Honestly, I'm not 100% about this. In my example, if I wanted to index columns (which breaks query folding) after filtering my understanding is that it will still execute the last query in the last screenshot THEN perform the indexing.
I just tested "remove column" and "remove other columns" in my report and neither of those came up as native query...even though they should be?
Filtering it shows as native query. No idea why that is