DAX Function CONCATENATEX is not supported on PBIRS / DirectQuery Mode

[blithechan]

Hi all,

I tried to use DAX function CONCATENATEX using DirectQuery mode. It works fine on PBI Desktop. But when I run the report on on-prem PBIRS, the following error message "Function CONCANTENATEX is not supported in DirectQuery mode".

Some DAX functions (e.g. STARTOFMONTH) is explicitly stating they are not supported in DirectQuery mode. But CONCATENATEX (https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/query-bi/dax/concatenatex-function-dax) has no such wordings until loading from PBIRS.

My on-prem PBIRS is the latest March 2018 release. Does anyone have any idea how to resolve this? Thanks

Regards,

Blithe

[Greg_Deckler]

Correct, if it isn't in this list, it isn't supported:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/analysis-services/tabular-models/dax-formula-compatibility-in-d...

Would need to understand exactly what you are trying to do to see if there is a solution. Source data, expected output, etc. Please see this post regarding How to Get Your Question Answered Quickly: https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Community-Blog/How-to-Get-Your-Question-Answered-Quickly/ba-p/38490

[blithechan]

Hi Greg,

Thanks for your quick response.

What i am trying to do is to concatenate a column's values into a list.

Source data

Currency

HKD

USD

RMB

Expected Output

HKD,USD,RMB

Thus CONCATENATEX sounds do exactly what I expect.

Appreciate if you can share any workaround to achieve the same. Thanks so much.

Regards,

Blithe

[Greg_Deckler · Accepted solution]

Hmm, yeah for something simple like that you could do something like:

Measure = 
MAXX(FILTER('#Currencies',[Currency]="HKD"),[Currency]) & "," &
MAXX(FILTER('#Currencies',[Currency]="USD"),[Currency]) & "," &
MAXX(FILTER('#Currencies',[Currency]="RMB"),[Currency])

But that's really not any better than just creating a measure that is = "HKD,USD,RMB" and I assume this is a small subset of your data.

[blithechan]

Thanks Greg for suggesting MAXX function. It serves the purpose well.