Gateway Administrator Removed

[bert631]

By accident, the Gateway administrator was removed from the "Manage Gateways" form in Power BI online.

As a result, we can't manage the Gateway anymore.

I've registered a new Gateway on the SQL server and add it in Power BI online. When I want to add a new Data source, it still lists me the old one (for which we haven't got access anymore).

When I select the newly created data source and connect to a cube, the data set returns an error:

"Report could not access the data source because you have to select which gateway you would like to use".

When I click on "Choose a gateway", I can see the old one with status Offline and the new one with status online.

 

When we try to create a Gateway with the same name as the one without admin account on the SQL server, we receive an error that the Gateway Name already exists.

Since the old Gateway doesn't have an admin account, how can I completely delete it?

[v-yuezhe-msft]

Hi @bert631,

In your last screenshot, what is the result when you select the online data source to connect to?

I am trying to test the scenario as yours, but I am not able to reproduce your issue. When I firstly delete the Administrator from Manage Gateways as shown in your first screenshot,  the administrator is not deleted immediately. The process of deleting Administrator seems to get stuck, I refresh the current webpage and get the notification as follows.


After that, I try to connect to SSAS database from Power BI Service, everything is well. It works even if I create a new gateway and create new data source under the newly registered gateway.

How do you delete the administrator from Manage gateway? Do you register the two gateways using same account?

[bert631]

Hi @v-yuezhe-msft,

---

 In your last screenshot, what is the result when you select the online data source to connect to? 

---

When I select the online Gateway, it works fine.

But this one is linked to the test SSAS server (Timesheet-RUAT). I can always create a third Gateway (f.i. Timesheet-Prod) and link it to the Production SSAS server.

But my point is that the first Gateway (without admin) still exists and still shows up in Power BI which could be confusing and annoying for my other colleagues.

---

 When I firstly delete the Administrator from Manage Gateways as shown in your first screenshot,  the administrator is not deleted immediately. The process of deleting Administrator seems to get stuck, I refresh the current webpage and get the notification as follows. 

---

I believe I had the same behaviour.

The service says that I haven't got any data gateway, which is correct according to the permissions. But there still is a gateway without any admin account, so nobody can manage it.

---

 After that, I try to connect to SSAS database from Power BI Service, everything is well. It works even if I create a new gateway and create new data source under the newly registered gateway.

---

Did you create the new gateway on the SSAS server itself by using the On-premise data gateway application? When I use the name "Timesheet", it gives an error: "Gateway Name has been taken".

Gateway name has been taken. Please choose another name.
Request error: Id: '670986d4-0a11-4e2f-9070-6a47a1191aca', Status code: 'Unauthorized', Timestamp: '10/24/2016 07:56:31 +00:00', ErrorCode: 'DMTS_UnauthorizedToCreateGatewayError', Detail: ''
   at Microsoft.PowerBI.DataMovement.ExternalClient.PowerBIDataMovementClientExtensions.<EnsureSuccessfulDMMSRequest>d__0.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location where exception was thrown ---
   at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.TaskAwaiter.ThrowForNonSuccess(Task task)
   at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.TaskAwaiter.HandleNonSuccessAndDebuggerNotification(Task task)
   at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.TaskAwaiter`1.GetResult()
   at Microsoft.PowerBI.DataMovement.ExternalClient.PowerBIDataMovementClientExtensions.<CreateOrReplaceUnifiedGatewayAsync>d__9.MoveNext()

I've uninstalled the on-premise data gateway and reïnstalled, but same message.

I also tried to "Migrate, restore or takeover an existing gateway", but after typing "Timesheet" in the on-premise data gateway name and the recovery key, it restores Timesheet-RUAT.

---

How do you delete the administrator from Manage gateway? Do you register the two gateways using same account?

---

I've always used the same account. The admin was removed from the power bi online service: manage gateways - Administrators - select Name - Remove

[v-yuezhe-msft]

Hi @bert631,

I get same issue when creating a gateway using the original name, and restoring gateway. Uninstalling and reinstalling gateway also don't work. I haven't found any method that can be used to remove the registered gateway and data sources under it once we remove the administrator.

I suspect that it is not supported to remove the administrator of gateway as there is no official article stating it, and when I remove the administrator , it is stuck.

Thanks,
Lydia Zhang

[bert631]

Hi @v-yuezhe-msft,

Thanks for your time to investigate it!

So for the moment, there is no way to remove the "Ghost Gateway".

Let's hope MS will do it for me one day and will add a rule in the Manage gateway menu to restrict removing and admin if it's the only one.

Regards

[dimazaid · Accepted solution]

hi @bert631,

Unofrtunatley there's no way to recover this gateway now. But we've added the capability mentioned below about now allowing the user to remove themselves if they were the last admin on the machine to avoid this scenario in the future. 
Thanks for reporting!
Dimah 

[mchris888]

I am having this same problem.  Is there any way to remove this "Ghost Gateway"?

[dimazaid]

@mchris888,

Did you recently delete yourself from the admin list? 

[mchris888]

I am not sure exactly how it happened, but it was awhile ago. I think it was a result of me uninstalling/reinstalling the gateway, during this process it is possible that I removed myself from the admin list as well.

[dimazaid]

Ok - thanks for confirming 

The reason I'm asking, is after the original post, we updated the Power BI UI to not let the user delete themselves if they're the only admins on the list. 
But unfortunatley, since it looks like you've removed yourself before the fix was deployed, you won't be able to delete the gateway.