Power BI
CompletedParameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
Pär Adeen on 06 Aug 2020 11:27:46
When using deployment pipelines, we can change parameters for datasets, but not for reports. This since standalone reports doesn't have parameters.
Using deployment pipelines, parameters can be used to change data sources, and this is like as useful when using a live connected report. I.E. we might want to connect to a development dataset in the development phase, and a production dataset in the production phase
Without this possibility, the deployment pipelines will never work as expected
Administrator on 15 Jul 2023 14:54:44
We now support auto-binding of each 2 artifacts across stages,
either in the same pipeline or across pipelines.
Read more about it in this blog post- Deployment pipelines- Azure DevOps extension, multiple pipelines working together, Dataflows GA | Microsoft Power BI Blog | Microsoft Power BI
- Comments (15)
- Merged Idea (1)
RE: Parameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
As this Ideas never gets the number of votes they deserve (my opinion). I'm just writing some lines to keep it alive. At least I can see there's 11 votes and thats almost record for me ;-)
RE: Parameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
Fully agree with this need.
Scenario:
1. Create a data model (DataModel.pbix) and publish it to its own workspace (WS-DataModel)
2. Create a report (SalesReport.pbix) using Get Data > Power BI Datasets > DataModel as a source
3. Publish SalesReport.pbix to its own workspace WS-Sales-Department
4. Create a deployment pipeline "Pipe-DataModel" for the data model and assign the Production stage to WS-DataModel
5. Create a deployment pipeline "Pipe-SalesReports" for the sales report and assign the Production stage to WS-Sales-Department
6. With Pipe-DataModel, select "Deploy to previous stage". As a result, a workspace WS-DataModel [Test] is created
7. With Pipe-SalesReports, select "Deploy to previous stage". As a result, a workspace WS-Sales-Department [Test] is created.
There should be a possibility to:
a. Point the "SalesReport" from "WS-Sales-Department [Test]" to the dataset stored in WS-DataModel [Test], and then provide deployment rules to point "SalesReport" from "WS-Sales-Department" to the dataset stored in "WS-DataModel". In other words, test reports should point to test datasets, and production reports should point to production datasets, with this switch being possible through deployment rules.
b. Rename a dataset through a deployment rule.
In the Power BI desktop, to know what you are working on, it is better to rename the PBIX file of the TEST version to, for instance, TEST-DataModel.pbix.
At present, however, this causes the TEST workspace to contain a dataset called TEST-DataModel.
The name of this dataset should be changeable to "DataModel" by means of a deployment rule at the moment of deployment.
As a result, a desktop file "TEST-DataModel.pbix" can be published to "WS-DataModel [Test]" whilst the production versions are called "DataModel.pbix" and "WS-DataModel" respectively.
This allows for a much better visibility of what you are changing on the desktop side.
RE: Parameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
It is imperative in order to make shared datasets and deployment pipelines both of value that they work together. A report built off a shared dev dataset moving up through the pipeline without being able to change the dataset it is built from doesn't work.
RE: Parameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
I strongly back this idea.
Splitting datasets and reports seems to be common good practice. Therefore allowing the dataset binding selection through the pipeline stages is fundamental. Please, if this is put into the roadmap, that you can have bindings across workspaces, hence allowing for a report only pipeline, and a dataset pipeline all with separate workspaces.
RE: Parameters for live connections to Power BI datasets - Needed to fully utilize Deployment Pipelines
We really need the ability to parameterize the data source setting. This will allow us to create a DTAP pipeline for the dataset/data model and separate DTAP pipeline for Reports. Microsoft have stated that the best practice is to separate the dataset from the report, but we are currently unable to use this best practice at Enterprise scale since Deployment Pipelines does not allow for parameterization of the Report to connect to Shared Datasets.