Paginated reports bring a new set of enterprise reporting capabilities to the Power BI service. They enable developers and BI professionals to create and distribute highly formatted, pixel-perfect reports. When leveraged using Power BI, paginated reports become the first cloud BI solution that combines the power of self-service BI, with the needs and capabilities of traditional Enterprise BI scenarios.
One of the most popular scenarios with SQL Server Reporting Services is embedding paginated reports into other applications. Today we are thrilled to announce the public preview of embedding paginated reports in your own application for your customers (also known as the ‘app owns data’ model).
Embedding paginated reports for customers, allows ISVs and developers additional flexibility when embedding intelligence into their applications, using Power BI APIs. ISVs and developers can take advantage of minimal development effort to achieve faster time to market. They can also differentiate themselves by infusing into their applications, Microsoft’s world-class analytics engine which already includes paginated reports on top of it. In addition, developers can spend time focusing on their solution to meet customer demands, instead of developing visual analytics features.
Tutorial: Embed Power BI paginated reports into an application for your customers demonstrates how to integrate a paginated report into an application using the Power BI .NET SDK with the Power BI JavaScript API.
The following set of capabilities supports the scenario of embedding paginated reports in your own application for your customers:
- Row-level security in embedded paginated reports - When you embed a paginated report, you can control which data is displayed. This allows tailoring the displayed information per user and provides a secure way of displaying a subset of the data, in a way that does not compromise the rest of data. It resembles the Row-level security feature, which provides a secure way of displaying data in Power BI reports.
Learn more about row-level security in embedded paginated reports
- URL parameters in embedded paginated reports – This capability, already supported in Power BI service, allows ISVs and developers to control their users experience by appending extra parameters to the generated Embed URL. You can try this by using the Power BI Embedded Playground sample tool, clicking ‘Try it’ on the Sample Paginated Report, manipulating the Embed URL, and clicking ‘Run’.
Sample_paginated_report_to_try_in_Power_BI_Embedded_Playground
- Here are a few examples to get you started:
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- To set a specific ‘Order’ parameter (for example, SO50689), append &rp:SalesOrderNumber=SO50689 to the end of the Embed URL
- To set multiple parameters, append &rp:BusinessType=Warehouse&rp:ResellerKey=51&rp:SalesOrderNumber=SO53532
- To export the paginated report to PDF, append &rdl:format=PDF
- Automation of paginated report tasks and operations – The powerful Power BI REST API calls were extended to support important, yet repeatable tasks, related to paginated reports. For example, the deployment workflow shown in the diagram below can be automated by using the following APIs:
Update datasource connection (API coming soon). An alternative is currently available by changing the datasource property in the RDL file (the RDL file format is public, and fully documented here)
Embed_paginated_reports_in_your_own_application_for_your_customers_Preview
What are paginated reports in Power BI
Power BI Paginated Report Builder
Embed paginated reports in your application for your customers
Implementing row-level security in embedded paginated reports