Traditional DBA looking for help with Power BI and Gateways

[edcarden]

Ive been aksed to setup in PowerBI something my boss can use that will use the Gateway to connect to a SQL Server DB thats in the could (SQL Server and not Azure).  SOmeone has already created a gateway and within that gatewya is a data set and the settings ofr that datset (i.e. SQL Server anme, DB namne, credentials) are all correct but when I go to WORKSPACES and then Data sets within power BI (https://app.powerbi.com)  I do see several data sets but none are named the same name as teh data set that is setup in the gateway.

I tried taking a quick glance at the tutorial but its setup so that you created the datset make sure it works and tehn you add it to a gateway so I'm not sure if that means the existing daat aset someone else steup in teh gateway is not visboible because they did not do it the way the tutroail shwos how to or what.  Lost of confusion here. Any help is appreciated.

[Greg_Deckler · Accepted solution]

Putting the data source in the gateway just makes that data source available to be updated using the gateway. Let's call this data source "bar". It does not put a data set named that in the gateway. Someone will create a Power BI file (PBIX) typcically and connect to that data source. They might call this foo.pbix. When they upload it (Publish) a dataset will be created called "foo". This "foo" dataset uses "bar" data source but it is still called "foo" in the Power BI Service UI. 

Clear as mud?

[edcarden]

Its still muddy but that helped.  I managed to create a new Data set connecte dto our cloud based SQL Server and tehn publish it and tehn from within BI Servcies set it to use the gateway and so far all green text (no errors) so I'll consider that a win. I think the issue si my boss created osmething local perhaps on a personal something-something and thats the issue.

[v-lili6-msft]

hi, @edcarden

Putting the data source in the gateway just makes that power bi service can access the data source.

For example:

In your SQL Server DB, there are 5 tables, and someone uses table1 and table2 create a report A and publish it to power bi service,

then table1 and table2 is a dateset A. 

Then you add your SQL Server DB into geteway, now you could refresh the report A.

And then you use Table3 and table4 to create a report B and publish it to power bi service, there will be a new dataset report B appear. and you don't need to add new datasource into geteway, because your SQL Server DB had beed added into gateway,

Report A and Report B is different dateset but they have the same data source.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/service-gateway-getting-started

Best Regards,

Lin