January 2022 PBIRS release breaks donut chart sorting

[johncpratt]

I just installed PBIRS Version: 1.13.8086.22725 (build 15.0.1108.159), Released: Feburary 23, 2022 to upgrade from Septebmer 2021 GA and it broke the donut chart sorting in existing reports.  Pie charts do not seem to be affected.  This appears to be related to the "Sort legend" feature that was included in this release. 

I have a completely separate TEST and PROD environment, so I am able to compare the exact same reports with the exact same data.

Specifically, I have numerous financial donut charts sorted by the dollar amount descending.  With the new release installed, donut charts now sort by the category label ascending instead of the dollar amount descending.  

Looking at my separate environments for the same reports, under September 2021 PBIRS the ellipsis button includes "Sort by: [category label], [dollar amount]".  In the January 2022 PBIRS reports, the ellipsis button only shows "Sort legend: [category label], Sort ascending, Sort descending".

[v-xiaoyan-msft]

Hi @johncpratt ,

I tested with the September 2021 and January 2022 versions of Desktop for Report Server, and upgraded the PBIRS version after uploading to the web portal, and now they are both up to date and do not reproduce your problem.
I will continue to investigate for you to see if any other users are having similar problems as you.

Best Regards,
Community Support Team _ Caitlyn

[johncpratt]

Thanks for the effort @v-xiaoyan-msft !  Here is some additonal detail that may (or may not) help. 

The affected reports were large financial reports, but from a size standpoint they range from 6 MB to 30 MB.  The donut charts included dozens to hundreds of categories in a non-filtered state, such as all budget code breakdowns for the agency.

In the same reports, I later noticed that some pie charts were actually converted to donut charts visually, although the sorting was not affected because fundamentally they were still pie charts.  This one was an eye-opener.

All testing was done with existing reports deployed to the September 2021 RS version.  Some had been developed and deployed prior to installing the September 2021 RS version.  I attempted deleting one of the affected reports from the server, opening it in the September 2021 Desktop, then redploying it to the January 2022 RS.  Same result (and I had to redo the data connections and scheduled refresh).

Because of the issues encountered, I have attempted to revert the server to the earlier version, and quickly ran into a big mess since rollbacks are clearly not expected.  At this point, I have the RS install reverted to September 2021 after completely uninstalling January 2022, and restored the ReportServer database backups from before the upgrade, but along the way the encryption keys got out of sync and all credentials for everything have to be reentered 😩.  So I can't retest on the server.

I did not attempt to install the January 2022 Desktop after having the issues with backward compatibility on the server.  If that can be shown to be a potential fix, I may give that a shot in the future.  But for now I have to stick with September 2021.

[v-xiaoyan-msft]

Hi @johncpratt ,

Based on the above information， if you are a Power BI Pro licensee, you can create a support ticket for free and a dedicated Microsoft engineer will come to solve the problem for you.
It would be great if you continue to share in this issue to help others with similar problems after you know the root cause or solution.

The link of Power BI Support: Support | Microsoft Power BI

For how to create a support ticket, please refer to How to create a support ticket in Power BI - Microsoft Power BI Community

Best Regards,
Community Support Team _ Caitlyn

[johncpratt]

@v-xiaoyan-msft ,

An update on my rollback to the September 2021 release.  Executive summary - IT had to do a full server snapshot restore because the Power BI reports and SQL agent jobs for the data refreshes were completely mangled and unrecoverable after restoring the ReportServer databases.

After restoring the ReportServer and ReportServerTempDB databases from backups made prior to the Jan 2022 upgrade, I was able to get the shared data sources for paginated reports to work again after several hours of work.  It was complicated by the fact that I deleted one of the data sources during troubleshooting, then readded it.  Existing reports remained pointed to the name of the data source, but the data source ID on the reports was cleared and not restored when the new data source was added.  I had to do some complicated research and then SQL scripting to assign the GUID for the recreated data source to all reports pointing to the name of the data source.

Then I started on the Power BI reports, and found that I could not manage, run, or replace any Power BI reports on the entire installation.  I could not upload reports, deploy from the desktop IDE, or even view properties on the deployed reports.  Because I could not manage the reports in the portal, I could not delete them to try a fresh upload.  In addition, all SQL Agent jobs and associated subscriptions for the data refreshes were corrupted and new jobs were added that were not pointing to valid reports (probably mis-aligned GUIDs).

I had two options:  completely wipe the entire PBIRS installation plus all associated SQL Agent jobs and start from scratch for everything, or have IT do a full server restore from a Veeam snapshot made prior to the upgrade.  I went with the Veeam snapshot, and it took less than 30 minutes to get back to "normal" (thank you IT).

I am now in a spot where I can re-test the upgrade once a potential resolution is found.  My upgrade process will change to having IT make a full server snapshot immediately prior to upgrade, then do the upgrade and test it.

[johncpratt]

I have now installed the May 2022 Report Server update, and encountered the same and additional issues with donut charts created prior to the January/May 2022 releases.

1) Donut charts lose the sorting by the value.  The Sort By menu only includes the category.

2) Changing a donut chart to a pie chart in the Visuals selector still displays a donut chart.

3) Changing a donut chart to a stacked column chart completely removed the Sort By context menu.

The donut chart sorting is changed immeditately for all reports deployed to the report server.  The donut charts also appear/sort incorrectly in the May 2022 Power BI Desktop, and that is where I attempted to change the visual type.

This time around, however, I figured out a partial solution.  I dragged the category value from the Details well to the empty Legend well and that immediately fixed the sorting issues #1 and #3 above.  Issue #2 still remains - changing the donut chart to a pie chart still displays a donut chart.

Since the sorting function is critical to the fundamental behavior of the visual, I consider this issue resolved given the workaround of moving the Details value to the Legend value.  I recommend that this be documented on Microsoft's site.