Power BI Output Tool - Date Formats

[allisonlevyHAL]

Hi,

We are experiencing issues using the Power BI Output tool. We understand that Alteryx does not allow you to output fields in Alteryx Date formats to the Power BI Output tool. As such, we have to manually make the fields strings. However, when you export a data set to Power BI, you are unable to edit the data set whatsoever (all of these functions are grayed out and not available in Power BI online or desktop). Unfortunately, this renders the Power BI Output tool useless to us if we cannot create datetime filters within Power BI. Has anyone found a workaround to get dates successfully in date formats when using the Power BI Output tool? I see many community posts and youtube videos about this but have not come across a solution yet.

Examples:

Parse error with Power Bi Output Tool - Alteryx Community

Power bi connector issues with data types - Alteryx Community

Alteryx - Power BI Output Tool Revisited! - YouTube

Please help!

[MReplogle1]

Agree with all the comments- Hoping someone creates a solution soon for this soon.  Not having a date field in Power BI for visuals and filtering is very limiting and frustrating...

[Tony_Castillo]

@MReplogle1At this point, the best thing to do is use Alteryx for data prep and transformation, output to a table or flat file, and use it as the Power BI data source. That connector is more trouble than it's worth. 

[Laxmi884]

I am also facing the same issue and not able to find the solution. Did anyone get a solution yet?

[Tony_Castillo]

@Laxmi884, I am not aware of a solution. There are too many flaws with Microsoft APIs that impact the Power BI connector, ADO, and other services that should be easy to integrate with. It's best to pivot your development now to save yourself additional frustration. Output to a table or flat file on a network drive, sFTP server, or SharePoint. Then, connect Power BI directly to that source. Good Luck!

[allisonlevyHAL]

Agreed with @Tony_Castillo . Our workaround has been outputting files to a shared network drive. Then the Power BI datasets pull in from that location. Our workflow is on a schedule via Alteryx Server to refresh throughout the day, and our PBI dashboard refreshes as well. This has been a pretty solid workaround to the connector not working.