Power BI Report server Report is **bleep** Slow: Can we host JS, CSS and Map files from CDN?

[Anonymous]

Hi,

We have deployed our Power BI Report server in london data center where we have deployed Power BI Report server in one large size VM. It is not in Azure Cloud. Now when user browse the blank page report it takes 1.5 minutes to render. Upon investigation I found that most of the time taken is due to JS files

1. /powerbi/libs/scripts/interact.min.js,

2. /powerbi/libs/scripts/powerbiportal.dependencies.bundle.js

3./powerbi/libs/scripts/powerbiportal.dependencies.externals.bundle.js

4./powerbi/libs/styles/powerbireportserverhost.bundle.css

5./powerbi/libs/scripts/powerbiportal.common.bundle.js

7./powerbi/libs/scripts/powerbiportal.explore.bundle.js

8./powerbi/libs/scripts/require.js

9./powerbi/libs/scripts/powerbireportserverhost.bundle.js

10./powerbi/libs/scripts/reportserverhost.js

11./powerbi/libs/scripts/globalize.js

12/powerbi/libs/scripts/globalize.cultures.js

13./powerbi/libs/styles/jquery-ui.min.css

14.https://az416426.vo.msecnd.net/scripts/a/ai.1.0.4.min.js

15./powerbi/libs/scripts/jquery-ui.js

16./powerbi/api/explore/resourcePackageItem/d0245eca-d40d-46ce-9dba-51942cf15095/SharedResources/BaseThemes%2FCY19SU06.json

17./powerbi/libs/scripts/resizeSensor.js

and CSS files and they take longer then usual to load into the web page. IS there any way we can upload the JS and CSS files into CDN and browse the report to make it faster. Is your answer is YES then how and where we need to make changes in the scripts.

Regards

Rajaniesh

[v-lid-msft]

Hi @Anonymous ,

Do you mean the css/js file also come from the on-premises Report Server, such as the url of report serevr is https://AA.BB/reportserver then the jsfile come from https://AA.BB/reportserver/powerbi/libs/scripts/interact.min.js?

If that we think it should be able to configure CDN like other the common website, try a CDN provider and configure by document, then CDN should able to cache the statics recource automatically.

We also find that there is a Property in Server Properties Advanced Page: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/reporting-services/tools/server-properties-advanced-page-reporting-services?view=sql-server-ver15

EnableCDNVisuals

(Power BI Report Server only) When enabled, Power BI reports load the latest certified custom visuals from a content delivery network (CDN) hosted by Microsoft. If your server doesn't have access to internet resources, you can turn off this option. In that case, custom visuals are loaded from the report that was published to the server. Default is True.

Best regards,

[Anonymous]

Dong Li,

I have gone thru this article but when I looked at the config files I could not find this specific file and location where I can search EnableCDN flag. Can you please paste the screenshot alont with the location of the file?Alos tell us what are the ports to be open on the server hosting the Power Bi because we can not open all the ports in the corporate environment.

Regards

Rajaniesh

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I could not find the EnablkeCDN tag anywhjere in my latest Power BI Report server installation. And now you are saying it is of no use? Can you paste the screenshot for the same where is the file and the folder is located. 

In our environment we use very strong encryption in the VPN and when servers are kept in remote data center you will face the latency issues. and the same is being faced by us. Why can not we host these heavy js and css files which takes too long to load into custom CDN or microsoft provided CDN and I have done the same experiment when I spun server in the west coast and ran the report from india the latency issue comes and it becomes worst when we use VPN so that is why I want to host JS, Images,CSS files and other assets  into CDN instead of wasting laetncy for these kind of assets. Today blank report without anything takes 1 minute 30 seconds to load and that does not makes sense.

Regards

Rajaniesh

[d_gosbell]

The setting Dong Li is talking about only affects loading of custom visuals, it will have not effect on the files you have listed or on the loading of a blank report.

This sounds more like a network issue than a Power BI Report Server specific issue. How long are these files taking to load?

I just doublecheck my prod server and even running from home over a VPN these files only take a few hundred milliseconds to download and it's doing a number of these in parallel. So my canvas is up and running in about 5 seconds over a VPN connection and then my visuals and report data starts rendering.