dataflows Azure Data Lake Gen2 type of storage

[Kpham]

Dear all,

I have a question about the Dataflow and the storage for premium per user license. When I read the documentation of dataflow with premium capacity then i would expect that the data is stored in dslg2. However a consultant told me that the data will be stored in a blob storage and that this data is only accessible with Power BI and not with any other tool like Azure ML or external tools. So he advised us to use Data Factory so that you can you use a SQL or Azure data lake storage where you have full access to the data. 

Can anybody confirm that the dataflow dslg2 storage is not only a blob storage?

Best regards,

Khoi  

[TomMartens · Accepted solution]

Hey @Kpham ,

please be aware that I'm just another consultant.

I assume that this article explains everything: Configuring dataflow storage to use Azure Data Lake Gen 2 - Power BI | Microsoft Docs

We are exactly doing this using dataflows (because of the domain expertise and the Power BI know-how) to create files that will be stored inside ADLS Gen 2 that will be used by other teams.

If you are not attaching your own ADLS Gen 2 then the output of your dataflows can not be used outside of Power BI.

And yes, in a way it's blog storage, but this is not a  bad thing as blog storage is one of the foundational storage types in Azure, that also is the backbone for ADLS Gen 2, read this: Introduction to Azure Storage - Cloud storage on Azure | Microsoft Docs

Hopefully, this helps to make your mind about ADF or dataflows.

Regards,

Tom