Forum Discussion

Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
Not applicable
3 years ago

Excel Workbook content in Power BI workspace - data refresh

How do I enable data refresh in an excel workbook uploaded to Power BI workspace?  The business had a simple request for a table of data with (on-prem) SQL server as the source (data gateway setup in service).  I successfully uploaded the excel workbook to a premium capacity Power BI workspace.  However, I cannot seem to find any way to get the workbook to refresh the underlying data (utilized Power Query).  I figured I would include this excel workbook content in a Power BI App along with other reports for the business team to view, but I need to find a way for the excel workbook to refresh (at least daily).  In Excel, I have no trouble refreshing the data manually or with the refresh upon opening feature selected. 

 

Please let me know how I can enable this solution.

Need Help

3 Replies

  • lbendlin's avatar
    lbendlin
    Super User
    3 years ago
     a table of data with (on-prem) SQL server as the source

    What is your reasoning for using Excel as an intermediary rather than pointing your Power BI report directly at the SQL source?

  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    Not applicable
    3 years ago

    Fair response.  It was an ad hoc request from the business and likely not much need for visualizations outside of the singular table.  At this point, I suppose I'm more interested in understanding what's possible with Excel workbook content in the Power BI workspace.

    • lbendlin's avatar
      lbendlin
      Super User
      3 years ago

      Where I work we call these BMTs  - business managed tables.  They are used for reference data that can be manipulated by business users.  These Excel files reside on SharePoint/OneDrive,  and they are not linked to any other data source - they are the data source.  If you import such an Excel file to a Power BI workspace you will get the synchronization for free and the data source for free.

       

      YMMV.