Power query using another workbook as source truncates text fields

[Anonymous11847]

I was referred here from the answers.microsoft.com community (Microsoft 365 and Office /  Excel / For home / Windows)  because Power Query questions are "beyond the scope" of that group, apparently...  I am NOT using Power BI, however, I'm using Excel.

I have a data source in one workbook ("ThisWeek") that points to a table in another workbook ("Tasks"). I have to have Tasks open for this to work but text fields are getting truncated - at 255 characters.

If I paste the data that I want to query into a test workbook and use the local data as the source of the query - it does not get truncated.

Is there any way to get around this?

[KT_Bsmart2gethe]

Hi @Anonymous11847 ,

Would you be able to provide some sample data with sensitive information removed as well as your desired outcome?

Regards

KT

[Anonymous11847]

Well, that's interesting.

I was going through, step by step, to see exactly where in the process the field was being truncated.  I had inserted a filter step to find a particular task I could post, as an example.  I don't think that I changed any of my original steps but, through this process -- it now looks like is no longer truncating that field.

Very weird.

This is a weekly process that I run.  I'm going to see if it works again next week, and will update this post then, if that's okay.

[sunnybeach]

I'm curious if the original file you were importing was actually exported from another system.  I ran into the same issue.  My solution was to open the data file and re-save it.  Then the fields that were getting truncated to 255 characters imported fully.