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.

[JohnF1966]

Two of my biggest obstacles with this On-Object Interaction were (and the solutions that made them useable):

1. The loss of the chevorns << and >> to expand and collapse the panes. Everything I read said I had to click on the down arrow and then select collapse in order to hide a pane. I just realized that I can do the same thing by clicking on the icon on the far right that corresponds to the pane and it will also collapse the pane. This is a game changer for me (in a good way) because It was a huge time waster for me to click on that down arrow, which I grew to dred so much because it often caused me to pay more attention to the menus than to the visuals I was creating. Maybe I missed it, but that shortcut should have been mentioned instead of telling us we had to click on the down arrow to collapse a pane.

2. The other obstacle was that the Build a Visual was located on the visual I was working on. This feature is cumbersome, takes up too much space in the work area and doesn't offer the advantages (or any advantage really) of having this pane next to the Data pane. The other game changer for me was to move the Build a Visual pane to the Pane Switcher on the right by going to the View menu and selecting Pane Switcher in the ribbon and then selecting 'Move Build a Visual to pane switcher'.

These two changes have made working with this otherwise combersome feature workable now. Even CTRL clicking to keep multiple panes open (that used to be a hasle for me) is now more tollerable because of the changes I mentioned above. 

[vanessafvg]

that worked perfectly, thank you!  

[CJSquibb]

I very much agree with this.  Docking the panes to the right with the Pane Switcher, then using the icons to open/close really makes a difference.  I still want the double-chevrons back, though!

[Anonymous]

I disabled it within minutes. Not really sure what problem you are trying to solve.

[Severofm]

Like everyone else, me too.

[AmirAle]

BUG?!!! Aggregation or Show as % of Grand Total no longer works (greyed out/faded) when this featrure is turned on.
On a positive note, I do actually like it. IMO, it's pretty easy to use once you get used to it, espcially since you don't need to go to the data pane to replace a measure or field. This reduces the steps and therefore saves time. 

[2MinutesTurkish]

Horrendous "feature". It actually makes building so much more complicated, clicking on a visual then dragging the measure/column all the way specifically to that visual's fields is not clever.

The current system of the Visualizations pane works well because it's static in location and layout. Please don't implement this rubbish as default in the future, and keep the Visuializations pane working as it currently does.

The idea of having additional formatting options on the visual is fine (font, pitch, etc.) but keep the main Visualizations pane as the main place to add/remove/alter measures and columns.

[Severofm]

I agree. There are several good ideas that I liked that can be implemented in the current visual, but the new visual as a concept is very bad.

[GettaB]

The search win is too narrow. Can only see full measure name on hover. I don't prefer this option on the visual. I prefer it on the pane and prefer to be able to see multiple panes at once. Not being able to see the selection pane and doing bookmarks is not optimal.

[foodd]

ya think.

[GettaB]

We renamed a number of measures. I want to update the visuals with the new fields, but nothing shows in the visualization pane. On some I can click the fix button, but this just deleted the fields. I need to still see the incorrect measures, so that I can see their name/order prior to replacement.

Performance is very inconsistent. Gettin a lot of error messages.

[Daniel_BDE69]

Hey,

I have been using for a week now and i have to say that i find it a bit more not nice to use when i have to visual stuff. I very much like to functionallity of the on object interaction in the sense that you can double click on the visuals and the get send to the visual pane and the section of that pane so you easy can change to simple things. But i really dont like the new look and structure it adds to the pane section on the right side of your screen. To me personal i have to use extra time to find more completed formating sections in visual pane.

So i would very much love to have to functionallity of the on object interaction with the visual with the double click and taken to the visual panel where to it the specific double click, but i absolutly perfer the "standart look" of power bi with data and visualzation next to each other.

I hope this help

[Severofm]

Me too.

[stevewingjr]

• What changes would you like to see?
  • Add a "Pin" icon similar to vertical tabs in Edge
  • Bring back Double-Arrow to "Collapse" icon next to "Close" icon (similar to legacy panes)
  • "Close" should not remove the icon from the pane switcher - it should just return it to the bar. The current "Close" action should only occur in the "Customize Pane Switcher" menu (or with a right-click option to "Remove from Pane Switcher")
• If you turned off the preview switch, why?
  • First time I tried I turned off immediately as it added too many clicks to work. Second time was better, I turned off after a day or so, but still not intuitive and still added too many clicks (though fewer than before)
  • I turned back on when I realized I could "ctrl+click" to open multiple panes. That's SUPER useful and actually resolves one of my biggest issues when interracting between two expanded panes, particularly the "Data" & "Build a visual (docked)" panes or "Selection" & "Format" panes when docked.
    
• Any suggestions for addititional settings or capabilities?
  • Better management/separation (or consolidation?)/identificaiton of specific "Format" object pane options. Separate contextual information is very confusing. When I select a visual, why do I get
    
    1. A dynamic ribbon for "Format" options on top (with NONE of these options available on a pane) AND
    2. Multiple TABS of "Format" options condensed on a single pane:
       
       • Page/Group/Shape/Visual/Button etc.
       • Properties
       • (with NONE of these options available on a ribbon - would much prefer the ability to perform the same action in multiple ways/places)
    3. Consider separating "Properties" pane icon from "Format" pane icon?
  • Add action similar to Panes in Excel that allow me to "Move" (undock) panes from the right side of the window to a separate (floating) window, dock on the left etc. I'd love to be able to move panes to my other monitor and keep my report/data view full-screen...would appreciate splitting Report/Table/Model views onto separate monitors as well.

[Severofm]

In short, Microsoft tinker and tinker and abandon development and return to the previous standard by introducing improvements. Fewer clicks is more.

[Anonymous]

Most useless feature of power bi, I wish this should not become permanent.

[CraigsterT]

It's rubbish.

[edgedata]

Hi,

I've been trying to get used to the on-object interaction feature since it was first released.  I think new users who have never worked with Power BI may be okay with it.  They would learn how to work with visualizations, setting and data this way from the start.  I've been working with Power BI since 2015 and am struggling to get used to this new way.  It's just too different from the original way of working with Power BI.  I'm much less efficient because I keep having to rethink where everything is and how it's laid out. For me. I feel it will continue to be difficult to work with since I've learned Power BI from the ground up with original way of working with objects.

Thanks for allowing the feedback!

[SDittmannFleet]

Just recently, when I click on a visual, what pops up is "Formatting options are unavailable for this visual". Never saw this before?

[SDittmannFleet]

MS Support confirms they could only reproduce the issue when they activated "on-object" interaction. This has me conclude that it is a bug and needs to be fixed. I for one will be reverting to the old way of doing things if it keeps happening.

[Severofm]

I have already returned to the current default and disabled the new one.