How to set up enterprise gateway in PBI service

[Anonymous]

I have an enterprise on-premises gateway set up correctly, that I can see and (possibly) use in order to connect published reports to the data source (SQL Server). My reports are, however, using an image of said DB as data source.

Do I need the IP address in the gateway settings to be the same as the data source I chose in my reports? Do I need to be able to connect to the final data source on PBI desktop as well as having the gateway set up? If so, what if I can not connect to the real datasource from PBI Desktop and need to use a dummy data source?

Does this field need to match the IP I originally used in my reports?

[ibarrau · Accepted solution]

Hi. I'm a little bit lost on the explanation but let's see if this helps.

The configuration of your gateway should be the same of your PBI Desktop. In the Gateway VM you can open the Power Bi Desktop and connect the sources. Check the sources in order to understand how many sources and how you have connected them. If you can connect with Desktop on the same machine of the gateway then you can configure it at Power Bi Service with the exact same name you are using for Server.

From Service, it's usually easier if you go to Schedule Refresh settings or Dataset Settings and open the Gateway section. It shows the sources you should add to the gateway and let you auto fill the textboxes of a new source for the gateway completing things like "Server".

You can think the Gateway configuration at Service like getting the data from the VM you have installed it. If you can read data from that VM then you can configure it.

I hope that helps,

[Anonymous]

Thank you @ibarrau , I managed to answer my question in the meanwhile, but it's always nice to have confirmation from another source.

What I meant was:

My report is configured to get data from a virtual machine (A) running on my office's network (say 10.0.1.1) but when distributing the reports I'd want those to get data from a Database (B) located in our customer's network (say, 127.0.1.1). Data is strctured the same way on both sources (A contains a copy of the database contained in B) so I would guess it should work. Notice A and B are on completely different private networks.

My original question would then be: do I need to set up a vpn in order to access B, so that I can design reports using DirectQuery on that data source?

To which, the answer would be: No.

Turns out I just needed to create a dataflow and connect it to the Microsoft provided gateway I set up on our customer's premises and then use that dataflow to design the reports.

Also, upon actually reading the article, I found out the answer I had been looking for was right under my nose all along.

[ibarrau]

I know it sounds logical to have a configuration on desktop and then change environments for service, however it doesn't work like that. The sources you use for Desktop should match exactly at Service. That's how the tool completes the server and suggests sources.

If you plan to change the DB like a different environment you might want to watch this video about parameters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnaDJkGOmIE

I hope that helps,