Skip to main content
cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

The Power BI Data Visualization World Championships is back! Get ahead of the game and start preparing now! Learn more

Reply
JimB-GA
Helper III
Helper III

unable to reference a field from a table

Hello all,

 

I am pretty new to Power BI and am on a steep learning curve.  I have a table that I cannot reference in a measure.  I can create measures successfully referencing every other table.  For example:

 

 I have a table I have named "Current"

Trade Time	Last	Change	% Change	Open	High	Low	Volume	T1	TIme
1547758619	262.81	1.8299866	0.701198	260.01	263.915	259.96	77,245,081	17913.6646050926	01/17/2019 03:57:01 PM

I am attempting to create a new measure in another table that references the "Last" field in table "Current" but when I look for the available field [Last] I cannot find it.

 

Is there some naming reference that I need to add to show this table and field in creating a new measure?

 

Thanks to all for your help.

 

JimB

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
AlB
Community Champion
Community Champion

@JimB-GA

You cannot reference a "naked" column within a measure. In a measure there is no row context so the engine does not know what row you are referring to. Have a look at this and or this

I would also stick to always using fully qualified names for columns, i.e. TableName[ColumName] instead of just [ColumnName]. The latter is best reserved for referring to measures:  [Measure]

View solution in original post

6 REPLIES 6
Anonymous
Not applicable

error, canot find column name .

can anyone help me

AlB
Community Champion
Community Champion

Hi @JimB-GA

Can you show the code where you get the problem and the error message?

Can you, ideally, share the pbix indicating where the problem is?

Hi, and thanks for reply. I cannot reference a field from one table to another in calculation.

 

My objective is to create a measure Total_Cost =[Last] (from Current table)-[New Price] (from Transactions

 

When I attempt to insert Measure  =[Last] in the 'Transactions' table, the error reads 

 

"The value for 'last' cannot be determined.  Either 'last' doesn't exist or there is no current row for a column named 'last'.

 

I have inserted link to file Test.PBIX in dropbox to illustrate. 

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/z585zgpfbtraiyc/test.pbix?dl=0

 

Thanks

 

Jim

Thanks so much for this solution.  Works like a charn..

Jim

Hi @JimB-GA

 

If you want to create a measure,you may use SUM Function as below.Total_Cost=SUM('current'[Last])-SUM(Transactions[New Price]).If it is not your case,please explain more about your expected output.

 

Measure = SUM('current'[Last])

1.png

 

 

Regards,

Cherie

 

 

Community Support Team _ Cherie Chen
If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.
AlB
Community Champion
Community Champion

@JimB-GA

You cannot reference a "naked" column within a measure. In a measure there is no row context so the engine does not know what row you are referring to. Have a look at this and or this

I would also stick to always using fully qualified names for columns, i.e. TableName[ColumName] instead of just [ColumnName]. The latter is best reserved for referring to measures:  [Measure]

Helpful resources

Announcements
Power BI DataViz World Championships

Power BI Dataviz World Championships

The Power BI Data Visualization World Championships is back! Get ahead of the game and start preparing now!

December 2025 Power BI Update Carousel

Power BI Monthly Update - December 2025

Check out the December 2025 Power BI Holiday Recap!

FabCon Atlanta 2026 carousel

FabCon Atlanta 2026

Join us at FabCon Atlanta, March 16-20, for the ultimate Fabric, Power BI, AI and SQL community-led event. Save $200 with code FABCOMM.