Localization of chart axis not possible

[SHellekes]

Hello everyone,

I am currently working at a report in the desktop app and not able to solve a localization problem. My native language is German so my Windows is set to German. The report should be displayed in English (even on German OS).

Regional settings for global (app+model) and the current file have all been set to English (US) initially at the creation of the pbix file.

For the date I am using a date table that creates all possible date formats and is linked to the other tables.

For some columns of the date table I can set a locale parameter ("en-US") which works perfectly fine. But for the line charts I have to use the date hierachy. The data should be displayed with a daily resolution while the X axis should only display months and years.

Now to my problem: The X axis of the line chart is always displayed in German (like "Mrz. 2024" instead of "Mar. 2024"). The tooltips are in English. The only way I found to display everything in English was to use the language GET parameter but this works only in the web browser. Am I missing something or is this a bug in the software?

[v-junyant-msft]

Hi @SHellekes ,

What is the language selected for your Power BI Desktop installation?
Power BI Desktop respects the model language for column names and values, but the display language of the Power BI Desktop application itself (including auto-generated date hierarchies) is determined by the language of the installation of Power BI Desktop, which in your case seems to be influenced by your OS language settings.

I would suggest that rather than relying on automatically generated date hierarchies, you create custom date hierarchies in the date table. This involves creating "Year" and "Month" columns (formatted in English) in the date table and then manually building the hierarchy from those columns. This way, you have full control over the localization of these elements.
Another approach is to use DAX to create calculated columns in your date table for the Month and Year, formatted in English, and then use these columns on your chart's axis. This method allows you to bypass the auto-generated date hierarchy's localization behavior.
Date and time functions (DAX) - DAX | Microsoft Learn

Best Regards,
Dino Tao
If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[SHellekes]

@v-junyant-msft Thank you for your help. Unfortunately I already tried creating a custom hierarchy and it did not behave like the original. I have a line chart that shows data in a daily resolution. Using the original date hierarchy I can display the X-axis monthwise (like Jan. 2024, Feb 2024...) and not every day is displayed. As soon as I use the localized custom hierarchy this changes and the axis shows every single day. When I remove the day from that selection the data is shown with a monthly resolution.

[v-junyant-msft · Accepted solution]

Hi @SHellekes ,

If you must display the data in day resolution, and the y-axis can only display the year and month, then only the self-contained date hierarchy can accomplish this; custom hierarchies cannot achieve this effect. Then you need to select English at the beginning of the installation of Desktop, otherwise the self-contained date hierarchy will be displayed in the language you choose to install.

Best Regards,
Dino Tao
If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.