Forum Discussion

gavin007's avatar
gavin007
Helper V
6 years ago

Saleforce Professional version refresh issue with PowerBi gateway

Hi, I have reply the followoing thread but there is no repsond. So I create a new thread here.

 

Here is the background of the issue

https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Service/Salesforce-Auto-Refresh-Issues/m-p/1128165#M97540

 

 Just to clarify. I have

-PowerBI desktop refresh SF OK. Does PB desktop not require SF API to connect?

-SF is professional version, which has no API according to my IT guy. 

 

Can you confirm if it is because PB gateway Service requires API and my SF professional version has no API that is the reason?

Need Help

3 Replies

  • v-diye-msft's avatar
    v-diye-msft
    Community Support
    6 years ago

    Hi gavin007 

     

    It's a typical question for years. After talking to both parties, salesforce and microsoft support; the only resolves I was able to find from microsoft were:

    -use only one link per report, even if you are working with multiple tables, recreate the report fetching multiple tables at once (which is absurd for incremental reports).

    -disable single sign on (which is another absurd idea because it might conflict company policy since this feature affects the entire salesforce users).

     

    Luckily for me, we do not use SSO for my company and recreated the report fetching 3-4 tables all at once so that only one link is used this time rather than multiple; for me it is working however if it goes incremental, according to my previous experience, I can guarantee that issue will recur since no party guaranteed that the connector have been updated or so.

     

     

    • gavin007's avatar
      gavin007
      Helper V
      6 years ago

      Hi Dina,

       

      I don't think my IT will allow SSO so that is out of question. but for the first point, what do you mean one link per reports? Currently, i have a single report need to retrieve different tables from SF to form part of the dataset. So it is kind of one refresh will fetch multiple tables from SF.

       

      Also, you are saying it doesn't work for incremental refresh? I don't understand the logic of it, maybe more because of the above question.

       

  • ReportMaster's avatar
    ReportMaster
    Post Partisan
    2 years ago

    Hi gavin007 I'm not quite sure about your issue, but since you mention your professional SF account doesn't have an API, As a workaround, maybe you can try to test your connection with a 3rd party connector. I've tried windsor.ai, supermetrics (which doesn't have PBI as a destination, so you first have to export to Google Sheets and then export to PBI) and funnel.io. I stayed with windsor because it is much cheaper so just to let you know other options. This connector pulls data through the SF API, so maybe it work for you and then you'll be able to refresh your data without using a gateway, just with the incremental refresh. In case you wonder, to make the connection first search for the Salesforce connector in the data sources list:

     

     

    After that, just grant access to your Salesforce account using your credentials, then on preview and destination page you will see a preview of your Salesforce fields:

     

     

     There just select the fields you need. It is also compatible with custom fields and custom objects, so you'll be able to export them through windsor.  Finally, just select PBI as your data destination and finally just copy and paste the url on PBI --> Get Data --> Web --> Paste the url.