Shared Data Cache in PowerBI

[Anonymous]

Hi there,

I have a question regarding reports refresh in PowerBI Service.

Situation: I have a report in PowerBI Service, connected to live SSAS. There is a scheduled refresh setup twice a day. The report is quite demanding, each refresh takes at least 30 minutes. Every user in a service can see a result of a scheduled refresh, until he/she presses Refresh by him/herself. From now on, the user uses the last refreshed data set until scheduled refresh 'delivers' a new one.

My question is: Is the refresh done by a single user somehow shared with other users? Or does every user wait for a report to be refreshed by him/herself separately (I mean in between scheduled refresh)? The problem is, from a scheduled refresh I get what is directly on a report but if I filter on certain country for instance, I have to do it by myself a wait.

In Tableau there is an option to share data cache for reports other users have already refreshed. The reason probably is, Tableau works on different principals: https://help.tableau.com/current/server/en-us/config_cache.htm

Thank you very much,

Iva

[v-xicai]

Hi @Anonymous ,

From the Microsoft official article,  Power BI limits datasets on shared capacity to eight daily refreshes. If the dataset resides on a Premium capacity, you can schedule up to 48 refreshes per day in the dataset settings.  While we know that On-demand refreshes are not included in the refresh limitation.

Currently, only the owner of the report can Schedule a refresh or run a manual refresh using the Refresh Now from the Dataset menu.

If other users need to run a refresh, they will need to take ownership of the Dataset using the Take Over button on the Scheduled Refresh screen.

It needs to be noted that the user who has taken over the report will continue to remain the owner and the process will need to be repeated by anyone else who want to run a refresh (including the previous owner).

This refresh of report visual process is less important because it is only relevant for live connections to Analysis Services. For these connections, Power BI caches the last state of the report visuals so that when you view the report again, Power BI does not have to query the Analysis Services tabular model. When you interact with the report, such as by changing a report filter, Power BI queries the tabular model and updates the report visuals automatically. If you suspect that a report is showing stale data, you can also select the Refresh button of the report to trigger a refresh of all report visuals in report view.

Best Regards,

Amy 

Community Support Team _ Amy

If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[Anonymous]

Hi Amy,

Thank you for your response, however I am not sure this answers my question. I will try to describe it more thoroughly.

First of all, it is not about a refresh of a dataset or its scheduling.

I meant a Refresh pressed directly in a report, see below:

Example:

• I create a report in a desktop with direct connection to a cube (live SSAS), publish it to the web, setup lets say 3 schedules a day (9am, 11am, 2pm)
• User who opens the report at 10am, will be served with a data result of an automated schedule from 9am
• If the report is open by the end user at 1pm, a data result of an automated schedule from 11am will be served
• If I, as a user, open the report lets say at 2:30pm, I can see the result of an automated schedule from 2pm OR I can press Refresh by myself (in a summarizing table with refreshes I will not see any refresh On demand)
• If I open the report at 3pm, I can see a refresh I did manually at 2:30pm, not the one that happened by an automated schedule at 2pm (am I right? this is what I have observed with one of my performance demanding report)

My question is regarding other users. What are they going to see at 3pm? The result of an automated refresh from 2pm or the result of my manual refresh from 2:30pm?

I am talking only about direct connection to SSAS. Hope I made it more clear and didn't spread more confusion.

Thank you,

Iva

[Anonymous]

Hi Amy, is there any update, please? Was my new explanation more clear? I suspect this will not work in PowerBI as I would expect b/c it is based on a different principal to Tableau. However, I wanted to confirm with you. Thank you very much, Iva

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

Hi Iva,

Unless a user refreshes manually at their end the data they will be seeing will be that of the scheduled refresh data only.

I guess, there is no cache sharing option in PowerBI as in Tableau which I think due to limitations such as RLS, etc.,

BR,

- Pavan M.

[Anonymous]

Hi Pavan,

Thank you for a quick response!

This is what I needed to confirm so we don't misunderstand our end users.

Thank you very much, Iva