Anonymous Credentials To Web URL

[srduval]

I am trying to use the web service connection to get data from the us treasury:

https://home.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/interest-rates/TextView?type=daily_treas...

I am able to connect to the website and get the data I need in power bi desktop, but I am unable to refresh it in service because it is missing credentials, but this website doesn't support anything other than anonymous access. How can I configure the datasource to refresh online?

[Burningsuit]

Hi @srduval 

Yes, using the standard web connector in Power BI/Power Query requires a Gateway to refresh the data when published to the cloud, even if the Web page does not require any authentication.

There is a possible work around.

In PowerQuery ("Transform data" when you connect to the Web Page in Power BI desktop) Change the "source" line, often the first line of the Power Query steps, from " = WebBrowserContents("**your URL **")" to " = WebContents("**your URL **")".

Microsoft's documentation states that:

Web.BrowserContents "Returns the HTML for the specified url, as viewed by a web browser."

whereas

Web.Contents "Returns the contents downloaded from url as binary"

So, depending on the web page you are using, you may see a difference, but in most cases this works fine.

Once you've made the change you'll need to go to the Credentials part of the Dataset settings for the web element...

and there Click on "edit credentials" and there set the Authentication Method to "Anonymous"

That should allow you then to schedule Refreshing for the web-page in Service.

Hope this helps

Stuart