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I built a report using PBI Desktop - the source is an Excel file on a public website (not OneDrive). When I publish it and then try to use the Power BI site to refresh the dataset, I get this error:
Here's the source web page:
http://abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/5368.0Apr%202016?OpenDocument
Here's a sample URL to one of the Excel files on that page:
http://abs.gov.au/ausstats/meisubs.NSF/log?openagent&536801.xls&5368.0&Time Series Spreadsheet&A6970A1F22604DBBCA257FC50017F8C5&0&Apr 2016&02.06.2016&Latest
Any ideas how I can overcome this?
option 1) is not possible - this is someone elses website (Australian Bureau of Statistics).
option 2) is not possible - the only machine where this error occurs is on Microsoft's Power BI Web server, i.e. app.powerbi.com. It works fine on my machine where that OLEDB provider is already installed.
Hi,
I've got exactly the same issue. Trying to pull XLS file from 'http://www.ofcom.org.uk/static/numbering/RID.xls'. Hope there will be an update soon.
Thanks,
Daniel
I've created an "Idea" for this issue - please vote it up.
https://ideas.powerbi.com/forums/265200-power-bi-ideas/suggestions/15081357-web-xls
3 votes!
@mike_honey, yes I see. I got the information from PG team that “refreshing against a .xls file is not supported”. So it will not work when users are trying to use the web datasource with .xls excel. I'm checking with the workaround, will post back when I got the information. Sorry for the inconvenience it brings you.
Thanks for the update Vicky, but that seems quite ridiculous. A Microsoft-hosted web service doesnt support using a Microsoft driver to access a Microsoft file type? We can access 50 different web services (most of which I've never heard of, but they do sound cool), but not an Excel file?
@mike_honey, as this article described: "Power BI supports importing or connecting to workbooks created in Excel 2007 and later. Workbooks must be saved as .xlsx or .xlsm file type and be under 250 MB". Currently, you need to change files from type .xls to .xlsx in order to fix this issue.
I understand the issue you're facing and will report back to PG team about your concerns.
Hello!
As far as I understand, no fix was put in place to allow .xls extension to be used as a source for Power BI online.
Did anyone find a solution for this issue? Is there any ideias on how to automate de file convertion for .xlsx or .csv fo instance?
Best regards.
Raphael Leis
I dont have any solution for this continuing annoyance. The post in the Ideas forum for this issue only has 13 votes, which is a lot less than the comments on this thread. Can all please vote early and vote often:
https://ideas.powerbi.com/forums/265200-power-bi-ideas/suggestions/15081357-web-xls
FWIW, my workaround is to use Power Update, a 3rd party scheduling product:
@Vicky_Song are you able to provide any update on this. It is an ongoing known bug. Thank you.
@Vicky_Song is there any update on this one. As @mike_honey says it seems a liitle rediculus that you can not refresh xls files and should not be that hard to fix.