Forum Discussion
External Tool to Update Dataflow Metadata??
No. I don't even see an idea for it though. What are you trying to accomplish? Even with an external tool, you'd have to edit the M code, save it, then initiate a refresh. What will the external tool provide that whe web UI isn't? Are you just trying to script a bunch of changes?
That workaround may save me some time, thanks.
As for "You cannot add columns to downstream dataflows that don't exist yet in upstream"... Maybe I'm not understanding fully, but I would edit the upstream dataflow metadata, then the first downstream metadata, then the next, so the fields would exist in the upstream dataflow, it just wouldn't contain any data.
You can do that today. When you save an upstream dataflow and save it, it creates the schema. Downstream dataflows or Power BI can see those columns but the table is empty during the refresh. If you don't need any data to do this, then just do that.
However, if you edit DF1 this way, then edit DF2 to include columns from 1, save and refresh, then start to work on DF3, if DF1 is still refreshing and DF2 starts a refresh, it may fail, or cause an issue in DF1.
Safer bet is to do the First 100 rows or something so you can at least see a bit of data to play with and know the refreshes are finishing quickly.