Issue renaming reports using GIT

[decarsul]

Good day all,

We've been using GIT to track our changes on reports roughly since the preview feature for powerbi projects came out. Its not been flawless but mostly manageable and getting better and better. However running into a rather nasty issue now.

When i want to change the name of a report, i can easily do so from the workspace. This however does not sync across to the app its published with nor with the connected GIT repository, it will keep its old name, even tho an update to GIT is required.

So you try to do a manual sync. Match the report name saved in the GIT workspace, by opening the report, saving as the new name followed by removing the report and semantic model folder of the old name.

You get the following order when trying to update from source control in the workspace:

Workload Error Message Unable to find the relative path (ByPath) reference to the semantic model. Either the by path referece is invalid or the semantic model does not exist.

So my question is: What exactly is the procedure to follow to succesfully change a name of a report. From local workspace to git repo to premium workspace and finally in the workspace app?

[rohit1991 · Accepted solution]

Hi @decarsul 

Renaming reports while using GIT integration can be tricky. If you just change the name inside the workspace, the GIT repo and the semantic model folder still hold the old name. That mismatch is what causes the ByPath reference error.

To properly rename a report, you should:

1. Open the report from the GIT-connected workspace and save it with the new name.

2. Remove the old report and its semantic model folder from both the workspace and the repo.

3. Commit and push your changes back to GIT so the repo reflects the new structure.

4. Update or re-publish the workspace app so the change flows through everywhere.

The important point is that both the report file and the semantic model need to be updated in sync. If the old folder remains in the repo, the workspace will still try to reference it, which leads to errors.

Currently, there isn’t an automatic rename feature for reports when GIT is enabled. It’s essentially a manual remove-and-recreate step to keep the workspace, GIT repo, and app aligned.

So the procedure is: rename<<clean up old files<<push to GIT<<update app. This keeps everything consistent without errors.

[decarsul]

Thank you for the reply. This helped me in the right direction. However cumbersome.

Did the following, checking source control on every mutation:

1. Save the report with its filename locally outside of repo as a pbix. (back up!)

2. Remove all traces off the report, first from workspace. Sync to Git, check repo / local workspace and remove traces from there too.

3. Save 'backup' back into local workspace

4. Push 'changes' to Repository

5. Update / commit in powerbi workspace via source control

6. Make available again in app.

[rohit1991]

Hi @decarsul 

To correctly rename a report with GIT you should first Save As with the new name in the GIT-connected workspace so the new report is created while still pointing to the same dataset. Next, go to Git and commit the new folder, then delete the old report folder and its semantic model folder, commit again, and push or merge these changes to main. After that, sync your workspace from Git so only the new report remains. Finally, open the app settings, remove the old report from navigation, add the new one, and republish the app. If you still see the old name or a ByPath error, it usually means the old model folder was not deleted properly-once you clean that up in Git and resync, everything will align. This way the workspace, Git repo, and app will all reflect the renamed report correctly.