Power BI in digital signage

[jamesc69]

We have a need to display Power BI dashboards within a business that can cycle through different reports.  We have looked at various digital signage solutions but each one of them falls down with not being able to authenticate with Power BI.  I see that it is on the roadmap to publish power bi dashboards to sharepoint, but is there any known solution for being able to display Power BI dashboards in a signage solution?

[hitzand]

@sieed We're running a POC at the moment and will start rollout soon, but we haven't had any logouts or crashes, and data is refreshed every time a report rotates in.  We don't have to go back in and sign in - you set up an application registration via the Azure portal and it uses that.  All reports in the 'My Workspace' section of the user you set it up with can be used in DisplayMonkey. We created a service account user in Power BI and use content packs to publish existing reports to that user's workspace.  You could also just publish reports to that user directly.  

[ed-hinchliffe]

For anyone new to this post, my company is currently in the final stages of adding support for PowerBI dashboards in our digital signage product.

We provide both the player hardware (pc with dimensions of approx 7.5cm x 7.5cm x 2.5cm) and a remote management interface + support etc. for a fixed monthly fee (from £30). Of course you can also then display other info on the screens as well (videos/images/messaging/yammer, etc.). If you're interested you get in touch via our website (pixelnebula.com).

[adelammari]

Dear,

I am interested in knowing more about your solution and company, please advise.

Regards,

Adel

[Kaijus]

Hi Adel,

In case this is still relevant you might like to check this link: https://www.valota.live/microsoft-power-bi We might have a solution for you. I'm happy to help with any questions you might have. Br, Kaijus

[elliotdixon]

Thought I would come back with the solution we have started to run at my company. Is working really well on about five different computers now. Never needs a restart. Refreshes BI dashboard pages every 5 minutes.

It is a Powershell script that opens a browser window and just cycles through the dashboards.

1.    place the .ps1 file on the Desktop
2.    place the .cmd file in the startup folder (in Win 10  = win + r and type shell:startup to open startup folder)
Ths script will open an ie window cycling through PowerBI dashboards every 10 mins

biscreencycle2.ps1 =

[CmdletBinding()] 

$source = @" 
using System; 
using System.Collections.Generic; 
using System.Linq; 
using System.Text; 
using System.Threading.Tasks; 
using System.Runtime.InteropServices; 
using System.Windows.Forms; 
namespace KeyboardSend 
{ 
    public class KeyboardSend 
    { 
        [DllImport("user32.dll")] 
        public static extern void keybd_event(byte bVk, byte bScan, int dwFlags, int dwExtraInfo); 
        private const int KEYEVENTF_EXTENDEDKEY = 1; 
        private const int KEYEVENTF_KEYUP = 2; 
        public static void KeyDown(Keys vKey) 
        { 
            keybd_event((byte)vKey, 0, KEYEVENTF_EXTENDEDKEY, 0); 
        } 
        public static void KeyUp(Keys vKey) 
        { 
            keybd_event((byte)vKey, 0, KEYEVENTF_EXTENDEDKEY | KEYEVENTF_KEYUP, 0); 
        } 
    } 
} 
"@ 
 
Add-Type -TypeDefinition $source -ReferencedAssemblies "System.Windows.Forms" 
 
#----------------------------------------------------------[Functions]---------------------------------------------------------- 
 
Function FullScreen () 
{ 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyDown("LWin") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyDown("LShiftKey") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyDown("Return") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyUp("LWin") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyUp("LShiftKey") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyUp("Return") 
} 

Function CloseTab () 
{ 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyDown("LControlKey") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyDown("F4") 
	[KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyUp("LControlKey") 
    [KeyboardSend.KeyboardSend]::KeyUp("F4")
}
 
#---------------------------------------------------------[Execution]-------------------------------------------------------- 
$errorActionPreference = "stop"

#Dashboards for user
$urls = @(
	"BI dashboard link1",
	"BI dashboard link2",
	"BI dashboard link3",
	"BI dashboard link4")

# time to display each screen 
$sleepSec = 600
$urlIndex = 0

# Start the app 
start microsoft-edge:$urls[0]
 
# Wait and send key stroke  
sleep 2 
FullScreen

while($true)
{
    CloseTab
    $url = $urls[$urlIndex]
	start microsoft-edge:$url
	start-sleep -s $sleepSec

	$urlIndex = ($urlIndex + 1) % $urls.length
}

BiScreenCycle.cmd

PowerShell -Command "Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted" >> "%TEMP%\StartupLog.txt" 2>&1
PowerShell -WindowStyle Hidden C:\Users\%USERNAME%\Desktop\BiScreenCycle2.ps1 >> "%TEMP%\StartupLog.txt" 2>&1

I think one of the conditions is that the browser (edge) needs to have the credentials of the user saved.
Make sure to replace the BI Dashboard links with what you want to look at.

[NickJ]

Hi, NowSignage are the only digital signage platform on the market that has a full integration with Microsoft PowerBI, allowing you to display your private reports securely. There are other solutions out there that enable you to display a link once it has been made publicly available which is clearly unacceptable when you're wanting to display private confidential data.

For more information please read: https://www.nowsignage.com/blog/2019/09/how-to-display-microsoft-power-bi-reports-on-a-screen-secure...

If anyone would like a trial then please let me know 🙂

[Kaijus]

Hi,

I would like to correct the previous information as Valotalive has had full native integration with Microsoft Power BI since 2018.

This award-nominated integration allows you to display your Power BI Reports and Dashboards securely With Valotalive Workplace Digital Signage. You can also leverage filters in your reports to go from a high-level report towards more detailed information to serve your target audience better.

 You can find further information in these blogs that cover the topics in more detail:

https://www.valota.live/single-post/2018/05/15/How-to-share-your-Power-BI-dashboards-on-info-screens

https://www.valota.live/single-post/2019/11/06/How-to-leverage-filters-when-using-Power-BI-on-Digita...

 Thanks

[hitzand]

@elliotdixon That's pretty nice.  I may use that for a case where we need to rotate through between some vendor-specific screens.  

DisplayMonkey has been a great signage solution for us.  We use it to manage about 20 screens in multiple office locations with a variety of reports, and it has run very smoothly for over a year.  

[ed-hinchliffe]

For anyone new to this post, my company is currently in the final stages of adding support for PowerBI dashboards in our digital signage product.

We provide both the player hardware (pc with dimensions of approx 7.5cm x 7.5cm x 2.5cm) and a remote management interface + support etc. for a fixed monthly fee (from £30). Of course you can also then display other info on the screens as well (videos/images/messaging/yammer, etc.). If you're interested you get in touch via our website (pixelnebula.com).

[sieed]

@jameslo30, what happens when power bi refreshes the reports while the auto tab is running? Do the rpeorts get updated or do you have to maually refresh the tiles? 

[jameslo30]

@sieed I've been told any updates to reports are refreshed instantly. But I've found that not to be true and so therefore I've had to use AutoRefresh plugin's to force the browser to refresh.

Thanks,

James

[acrmorris]

Jameslo30, could you kindly give some more detail on the your use of the Auto Tab program? Your solution sounds exactly what I need to display Power BI dashboards that I have been developing here.

Thanks for any assistance.

[jamesc69]

It is likely that we will want to rotate different Power BI dashboards and potentially have other content.  The signage solutions we've seen have the right kind of functionality, however none of them can pass authentication to a web page which is the challenge.

[embedsignage]

With embed signage you can show Power BI dashboards (securely authenticated - not public URLs) mixed with other content in playlists. Maybe it's suitable for your needs? Take a look here: https://embedsignage.com/features/widgets/power-bi/

[jameslo30]

It depends on what your company is using for it's authentication method and the software you are using.

That's where the complication ended when we just used a standard browser to show this information. Is there a possibility for you to use something like Chrome to access the data you want?