PBI Server May 2020 not refreshing saved reports

Hi josef78,

We have a fix underway, it is in the testing and validation phase. The current plan is to get it working, tested, then to release an update. It will be done as soon as we can. When I hear more about a date, I will post again.

Anonymous repro steps I posted here https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Report-Server/Power-Bi-Reports-Refresh-Problem-with-May-2020-Updated-Version/m-p/1161348

This issue (after update to vertion 15.0.1103.232) is affecting only scale-out deployments with multiple servers, which some servers are dedicated only to web front end, and some servers are dedicated only to background data refreshes ( configured via <IsDataModelRefreshService> settings in rsreportserver.config)

Every PBIRS app istance have own SSAS instance (like cache) data are primary stored in MSSQL DB on another server. When user is accesing to report, server first check if data are in SSAS cache, if not will loaded (log action ASModelStream), and continue with loading schema and queries (ConceptualSchema and QueryData). Data in SSAS cache stay until report is not used for expiration period (by default one hour), or removed soon by memory cleanup process in memory pressure, or forced removed due to data refresch (not working in May 2020 version), and of cource when restart server.

When run scheduled data refresh, server load data from DB (ASModelStream), run refresh (DataRefresh) and store in DB (SaveToCatalog). 

When rerun report after refrech on single instance deployment, the problem is not visble, because front-end and backgroud process are on single server and have shared SSAS cache, reported data are fresch because using same SSAS cache which has refreshed.

But if you rerun report in scale-out deployment, in May 2020 release, there missing step that retrie SSAS cache with old data on all PBIRS servers. When rerun report in scale-out deployment after data refresch, all severs must reload fresh data from DB.

This is big problem in lagre PBIRS deployment for critical business reporting. If you have single server, there is not problem now, because there is only one SSAS cache. If you have scaleout deployment, but you reports are refreshehed or used not often, there also not problem (if you are refreshing daily in night, and users open report morning, cache will be retried after some time). But if you are reports used for critial business process, and this reports are used constantly, SSAS cache never will be expired, and datarefresh NEVER affected (until restart all PBIRS front end servers)

Yes, we are looking at it. No ETA, as we don't know how to fix yet.

bradsy d_gosbell  Great thanks, I will wait for any new information about ETA and any solution about this issue.

It's very important for me, because I have this version on production environment in large scaled-out deployment with many thousand users with continuous usage of business critical reports. Go back to Jan20 is very complicated, and workarounds for this issue is very limited (only restart PBIRS service every hour). I work on some additional workaround (checking SaveToCatalog action, connecting to SSAS instances, and deleting related DB from SSAS to force reload it), but it is also complicated and terrible.

bradsy   Any news ?

It is being worked on. This is a touchy area of the code and will take time to validate no more regressions. No ETA.

Hi bradsy  any news?

bradsy same question, any new information or ETA?

Great 🙂

• Version: 1.8.7485.35104 (Build 15.0.1103.234), Released: June 30, 2020
  • Bug fixes
    • Fixed an issue in scale-out scenarios where reports weren't reflecting edits immediately in the server after upload

I go to apply update to test farm, I hope that is finally solved

Thanks 

Hello,

I have upgraded to the new release of the PowerBI Server and there is update also for PBIDesktopRS_x64:

OLD: Version: 2.81.5831.941 64-bit (май 2020 г.)

NEW: Version: 2.81.5831.1181 64-bit (май 2020 г.)

I am refreshing only manually, because the automatic scheduled refresh is not working (I have another post for this issue). I checked and now everything is ok, thanks!

 josef78  How did you know for the new release, because it’s just a new build not a version, maybe I could never find it if you haven't posted a link here?

d_gosbell sorry, previous comment is for you

josef78 - no worries. I saw your previous reply anyway and I've passed on the repro steps to my contacts at Microsoft. I'm assuming that bradsy will have logged this issue anyway

Thank you for the update either way. 🙂  Our newly integrated team is experiecing minor issues around this on our two prod servers so we'll be keeping an eye out for updates.

bradsy Thanks for the update. We're holding off testing/upgrading to the May release because of this bug.

There is a new version released on 30-06-2020

Great to see it shipped. Any thumbs up or down for anyone who has tried it?

bradsy Updated yesterday, Thumbs up from me so far 🙂

josef78 Ah, thanks Josef. Where did you find that changelog? Could you provide a link?

Thanks

Here is the link to the change log:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/report-server/changelog

Do we know if that's the only bug fix? Because that doesn't sound like it addresses the original issue of reports not refreshing...or am I misunderstanding the cause of the original problem? Maybe the issues we're seeing with some scheduled refreshes failing is some other problem...