Manage pbix files within team

[itchyeyeballs]

Hi all,

Would like to get some ideas on how we can best manage our .pbix files, we have a team of analysts who will all need to be able to access and modify the files, we have a relatively small number at the moment but expect this to grow rapidly.

We have tried to set up a section within our SharePoint site to keep everything in one place and enable version control, however the designer doesn’t seem to be able to read files from it.

Has anyone got a good solution (or a way to use SharePoint?), we do have access to TFS but it really didn’t work well with managing .xlsx file sso wouldn’t expect it to be any better with .pbix.

[v-danhe-msft]

Hi @itchyeyeballs,

Could you please tell me if your problem has been solved? If it is, could you please mark the helpful replies as Answered?

Regards,

Daniel He

[itchyeyeballs]

Hi,

Havent 100% resolved yet,

After some digging about we are currenlty testing out using the sync functionality of Sharepoint online to have local copies of files the PBI desktop can read but then get shared automatically, not perfect but seems to be a reasonable solution.

We are still looking at how to impliment enterprise level data models that give us the flexibility and security we need.

[MattAllington]

There is no one correct answer of course.  My view is it is good to aim for some centralised central data model with individual flexibility for variance. You can read some of that here https://exceleratorbi.com.au/new-power-bi-reports-golden-dataset/

[itchyeyeballs]

Thanks Matt,

We will definitly look to utilise the golden dataset techniques you describe, seems the ideal way to manage the data models.

It would be usefull though if MS pubished some guidance on how teams should work with the designer to maintain consitency and security, I've not been able to find anything definitve on how to create strightforward workflows.

Some examples of issues:

Maintaining security of underlying data

  - The export data settings seem to revert back to deault every time an update is published

  - We are using the hide tables functionality to protect sensitive data from being exposed in underlying datasets, this is really 

clunky and time consuming

Version control 
 - Looking for ways to manage the pbix or pbit files so they can be easilly version controlled

[MattAllington]

Power BI is definitely not perfect.  If you find something that you would like changed (like export data settings), you should search for it at http://ideas.powerbi.com and vote for an existing idea, or create a new one.

Hiding tables is not secure.  If you are using PowerBI.com then you should be using Row Level Security.  There are plenty of materials for this - anything from Adam Saxton can be considered gold standard.

[itchyeyeballs]

Thanks Matt,

Does that mean we need to pre-aggregate all the data before import to model?

We need the users to see summaries/analysis of entire dataset (and be able to slice and dice by lots of metrics), just not be able to get at raw level.

Our main concern is we don't know all the caveats, it's hard to find a definitive guide on how to make models secure, there could be X number of ways to do things that we don't even know about.

[MattAllington · Accepted solution]

Yes. Generally you implement RLS to show the data only relevant to the user. If you need totals for the business, user share if total etc, then you would need an aggregate table to do that work for you. 

[kazael]

Hi,

You can implement row level security through PBI Desktop, here's a great guide: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/service-admin-rls

Another way to have persistence security for your models which will be uninformed for all the developers is by creating the model with SSAS.

[kazael]

Another interesting tool I found recently is the Power BI Documenter by Data Vizioner

I don't have much experience with it but it looks like it might be helpful for your needs

check it out here:

https://biinsight.com/what-is-power-bi-documenter/