Dataflows are a self-service, cloud-based, data preparation technology available in Power Apps, Power BI and Dynamics Customer Insights products and portals.
Dataflows keep your data up to date, so it can be leveraged by Power Apps applications, Power BI reports and Dashboards, Dynamics Customer Insights and many more products and solutions that leverage Data stored in Dataverse or Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 accounts. There are many use cases for dataflows and you can learn more about how dataflows could be leveraged in your scenarios requiring data preparation in our documentation.
A top ask from our community members was to Integrate Dataflows with Power Automate. The most common asks were to trigger a when a dataflow run has completed, and to initiate a dataflow run when different events occur, for example, when new data is available in one of the Dataflow sources.
Today, we’re excited to announce the Preview availability of the Power Automate Dataflow connector along with templates and sample scenarios you can get started with right away. The new connector provides a new way to react to dataflow events to take action on dataflows. Combined with other Power Platform Products connectors and the 400+ connectors available in Power Automate the possibilities are endless.
New Dataflow connector templates and samples
There are several patterns we wanted to help address with the new connector. Below are just a few of the templates and sample scenarios documentation now available with the new Power Automate Dataflow connector:
Send a Notification when a Dataflow Refresh Completes
When your dataflow refresh completes, you or others who manage or depend on the dataflow may want to receive a notification to alert you of the dataflow refresh status. This way, you know your data is up to date and you can start getting new insights. Another common scenario addressed by this tutorial is notification after a dataflow fails. A notification allows you to start investigating the problem and alert people that depend on the data being successfully refreshed.
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Setting up a condition when a dataflow refresh completes, above, and the available dynamic content available to leverage, below:
Trigger dataflows and Power BI datasets sequentially
Both a Power BI Dataset and Dataflows can get data prepped by another dataflow, leveraging that dataflow as a data source. One reason for refreshing multiple dataflow sequentially is explained in our documentation about separating complex dataflows into multiple dataflows. When the Dataflow that acts like a data source completes its run successfully, a downstream, or dependent Dataset and/or Dataflow should be refreshed ASAP to reduce time from when Data is available to when it can be used or further processed. When a dataflow fails, the dependent dataset or dataflow does not need to be refreshed, to conserve resources and also be ready to be refreshed as soon as the upstream dataflow is fixed and its refresh is successful.
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Build a dataflows monitoring report with Power BI
One of the top customer asks has been for the ability to monitor the status of multiple dataflows, across environments and workspace, by one of more people. With this new tutorial and samples, you and other authorized people in your organization can both monitor all your dataflows in a central location, and view their refresh status over time.
All of the above use cases, and more, are now available for you to try in the Power Apps Portal, with the new Dataflow connector actions and triggers:
Trigger a flow when a dataflow refresh completes
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There are times when taking action as soon as a dataflow refresh completes is critical or can reduce time from when the data is available, to when an action on the data can be taken. When a dataflow refresh completes trigger allows selecting dataflows created in Power Platform environments and workspaces. When the event is triggered, the details of the dataflow refresh, including its name, the status of the refresh, when it started, ended and how it was initiated and more, will be available to leverage in Power Automate.
Initiate a dataflow run or refresh, when an event occurs
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When new data is available at a data source, there is no longer a need to wait to consumption and prep it with Dataflows. The Refresh a dataflow action enables automation of the dataflow refresh operation and combined with 400+ available Power Automate connectors, you can now refresh a dataflow exactly at the right time! The new action allows selecting dataflows created in either Power Platform environments or workspaces.
Next steps:
Get started today with Power Automate templates for dataflows
- Overview of Power Automate templates for dataflows
- Send notification when a dataflow refresh completes
- Open a ticket when a dataflow refresh fails
- Trigger dataflows and Power BI datasets sequentially
- Use Dataverse to build a dataflows monitoring report
- Use Excel to build a dataflows monitoring report
- Use a Power BI dataset to build a dataflows monitoring report
Learn more about Dataflows
We are excited to help you deliver greater impact for your business with Dataflows, and hear your Ideas and feedback in the Power Apps community portal.