Share your thoughts on the new On-Object Interaction feature (preview)

[RosieL]

Hit Reply to tell us what you think about the new On-Object Interaction feature so we can continue to improve.

For example:

• What changes would you like to see?
• If you turned off the preview switch, why?
• Any suggestions for addititional settings or capabilities?

Thanks,

-Power BI team

To read more about the feature, see the announcement in the Power BI Product Blog or our documentation on how to Use on-object interaction

FAQs:

• Q: How can I open multiple panes at once?
  • A: You can CTRL + click or right click on the unselected pane you wish to open and choose "Open in new pane"
• Q: Where did aggregations move to?
  • A: It's still on right click of a field, or you can use the new flyout aggregations dropdown while choosing or swapping a field.
• Q: Where did drillthrough and tooltip page setup move to?
  • A: Drillthrough is now in the page settings of the format pane under Page Information > Page type > Drillthrough or Tooltip.

[foodd]

Good point, and that about sums it up.

[LewisCoghlan]

Hey All - maybe not the correct answer, but in response to everyone asking why they keep pushing time and resources into this feature despite the community showing zero interest is answered by viewing a demo for the future AI report builder for PowerBI/Fabric. 

My gut tells me that Microsoft are aggressively pushing towards a future where the development of reports is basically just providing a dataset and using natural language queries to get an AI to build your visualisations for you. From this perspective, On Object Interaction makes a lot of sense, as building a report will basically just be formatting and re-arranging, not actually building measures, adding data fields to visuals, or building out anything at all. 

I hope that this won't result in the old development interface being scrapped, because I am dubious that this approach will be able to effectivly replace ALL report building, but based on the demo I've seen I can definitely see that in the next few years we'll be able to use AI natural language query to build 80% of reports, and then only the more complex 20% will require actual development.

[germo]

I'm not against the idea of On-Object Interactions if they are well designed and implemented. It's the way it's happening that's the issue. There seems to be massive pressure for it to happen. Maybe actually with the goal of replacing the majority of us developers with AI. You see the trend everywhere: you want to, but it doesn't yet work the way you want (fortunately for us) with AI.

Surely a mandatory requirement should be that a new feature is better than the existing implementation, that no functionality disappears, that operation becomes more intuitive and requires fewer clicks. These things are not given here: Functionality disappears, you need more clicks, it is less intuitive.

If you're going to force a feature like that into the product for whatever reason, then please make it an optional extra. Then we could turn it on and use it occasionally without being disturbed too much in our daily and usual work.

[gtmoten]

maybe I don't hang out in the right places, but it seems that it is just crickets from MSFT in response to the ovewhelming disappointment and negative feedback about on-object interaction.

If they are unable to articulate a compelling resaon for implementing it, what is their purpose?

[CraigsterT]

I couldn't agree more. They pulled the same crazy , insane stunt in October '21 when they changed the DAX editor over to the current monstrosity and that time they literally did spring it on us without any prior warning or justification whatsoever and didn't even acknowedge that this change had been made. This drove most users serious about DAX, or frankly those that just wanted to be able to see the DAX that they were authoring over to Tabular Editor 3 , such ws the shody implementation. Now we are here again. Personally , I think the 'On object'  idea is for want of a better term,  "absolute crap". There is no justification to it and Microsoft need to 'Listen' to the user base and fall in line. It's a knock back , but it's better than a reduced user base and an abadoned product. 

[LewisCoghlan]

100% Agree. Definitely not trying to indicate that I'm in support of the changes whatsoever - I think the on-object interaction is a terrible piece of functionality for the purpose of PowerBI as a tool that objectively makes the product worse to use. Microsoft is going about it's development and the communication of it's motivaitons in a truly appalling way that is causing anxiety amongst the user base as to the future of the product. 

However, in lieu of Microsoft actually sharing WHY they are pushing this "improvement" out (despite the communities recurring questions) I thought I'd try and give a plausible reason that may at least try and help explain and dispell some confusion.  

[QC]

If AI can replace PBI, then it can also replace SQL, SSMS, but nothing happened to those. Also, I could not see the logic how turning a good, universally liked UI into a terrible one helps MS with anything. Surely MS can find other way without alienating its entire user base. 

[Severofm]

I agree.

[germo]

When Power BI came out many years ago, I was skeptical at first because of many missing features. Then Power BI got better and better. In the meantime, I even prefer Power BI for tabular modeling. Not because it is easier, but because the overall concept of Power BI Services and Fabric convinced me. And that's been the case since Fabric came along. I even started recommending my customers to switch from SSAS instances to Power BI Services / Fabric.

And no sooner had Power BI / Fabric convinced me as an overall concept, than all of a sudden such a preview feature comes - like a hammer on my head. As if God wants to tell me: Keep your hands off Microsoft, don't get too dependent.

Instead of improving the product, important and proven functionality is removed. How can you use a feature like this for productive use of Power BI? How is one supposed to work seriously with the existing limitations? Especially since the description of the limitations is also incomplete, there is no indication that conditional formatting can no longer be created. By using this feature, there is even a risk of destroying existing reports.

My trust in the Power BI product management has suffered a lot due to this feature.

We know this phenomenon from many vendors who develop modern looking apps with missing features because they think they should keep up with the times: First with the parallel possibility to use the products classically and in the mobile app. Then one day the forced redirection from the mobile browser to the app takes place. With the result that normal work is only possible via a desktop, but no longer on the smartphone.

Is Power BI now also infected by this disease: Hip and Cool and Modern instead of Functional? Can we still trust the development of Power BI? Have I backed the wrong horse?

What if there are multiple Power BI developers in a company: are there administrative ways to prevent the use of certain preview features to prevent the accidental destruction of existing reports? Until this feature, it would never have occurred to me that users should be forcibly protected from features. There is definitely a clear warning missing here before activating the feature: "Existing reports can be accidentally destroyed. Many features are missing. Do not use this feature productively, only for testing."

[GaryC]

I agree and my shared concerns.

[Severofm]

I completely agree, I really hope that MS changes course and returns to its origins.

[gtmoten]

The thing is @RosieL it's baffling as to why MSFT keeps putting resources into this feature when the userbase is screaming out for (1) new, better and more functional visuals, (2) speed and efficency improvements, (3) more modelling and ETL features..... it's disheartening.

[atleasttwochars]

100%. I have seen almost none of that in the last 3+ years that I have been using Power BI. All of those were my biggest gripes about moving to Power BI - those issues can only have gotten worse.

Ease of developing simple dashboards by new users was arguably Power BI's outstanding feature - this UI change will take even that away!

[germo]

It is a terrible feature, because it is not feature complete. For example, how to add conditional formatting to measures?

And sometimes these On-Object buttons are available, sometimes not.

The classic way worked fine for many years, these new feature is like an alpha version. Please focus energy on more important features.

Previews are fine, if they add something. But previews are not good, if you remove existing features and functionality.

[TomGee702]

Dear Microsoft - Please, please stop focusing on things no one wants or likes instead of addressing the requests by the people actually using the product!!!

[ctappan]

As a UI designer myself, I know better than to think that MS is going to maintain the current UI and the new UI indefinitely. It's disappointing that someone at MS has blindly decided on a path that is clearly unwanted by the vast majority of users. I'm sure you feel like you're incorporating user feedback, but only inasmuch as you're incrementally improving a fundamentally bad design decision. You're breaking the cardinal rule of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". Everything in the current UI works, is intuitive, and efficient, but for some reason MS is charging forward with its own ungrounded UI, apparently for its own entertainment, forcing existing users to entriely re-learn how to use PBI and making it harder for new users to learn it. I've been using PBI for several years and have typically championed the ongoing developments, but development for development's sake is a really worrying precedent that gives me concern that I can't trust PBI as a long-term solution.

[foodd]

This is reminiscent of the BalmerBelfiore team at their finest 😞

[jimbob2285]

BalmerBelfiore team... Who's that?

[Severofm]

I completely agree with your thoughts.

[GaryC]

Agreed. Seems MS is more interested in changing the UI for appearances sake (a.k.a. "new and improved") rather than addressing less flashy, but more desired features requested by their users. They see all this resistance and still press on with unwanted changes.

[Rudz]

Another factor for Microsoft to consider, is that when a user responds to this thread, they automatically receive an email with every new comment. This means that every person who has commented here receives multiple emails every day showing not just negative, but increasingly hostile responses to this feature. People used to say "I'll never use this," and then "I won't use Power BI if this becomes the only way," to now "I'm going to stop using Power BI because I assume Microsoft is going to make this the only way." Because we are all subscribed to this thread, this overwhelmingly negative sentiment multiplies in the hearts and minds of the core user base. It is painful to watch this go on for months without Microsoft addressing how they will turn this around, what the long term plans are for this feature, and why Microsoft continues to invest in such a wildly unpopular feature.

My opinion is that this feature is being pushed too aggressively and with very poor testing. After multiple crashes early on, I haven't touched it. Things like managing panes is such a basic usability issue, that I don't think Microsoft is doing any significant testing before we see it. While this is ok for small features that are mostly polished, this change is too big and too rough still. It feels like we are alpha testing, not beta testing. The whole world should not be your alpha testers! We are on a monthly release cycle, so by the time we give you feedback, it takes months before the fixes come back to us. That isn't workable for such a large change. At the pace you are on, it will take years before this change is usable. And you are depleting your pool of testers when people turn it on and have to turn it off after 5 minutes of testing. Many have made up their minds on this change by now and won't touch it anymore. How are you going to get feedback then? You need a smaller, highly active test group of seasoned developers who want this feature and a weekly release schedule. Pull the preview until your alpha testers are happy.

Something needs to happen though. Continuing on as-is hurts the trust we place in the development team. This thread is a festering pool of negativity. If you don't address it somehow, I think you will see the sentiment toward Power BI continue to decline with your core users.