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Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

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sreinman on 11 Dec 2015 01:10:56

At this point, only Excel workbooks with a power pivot data model can work in Power BI. It would be great to have the ability to upload Excel workbooks that are connected to our on-prem analysis services to be refreshable as well. The same way that the analysis services connector works for PowerBI reports, perhaps that connector can be extended to uploaded Excel workbooks as well.

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8e39f54c 5a0d-475d-8780-e56fa94a93cd on 06 Jul 2020 00:15:05

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

planned since 2016 lol ;)

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7852d239 bc9a-4429-af9c-76a635bad7da on 05 Jul 2020 23:27:09

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

please vote also here in Excel Online Uservoice https://excel.uservoice.com/forums/274580-excel-online/suggestions/33793252-pivottables-created-with-power-bi-using-analyze-in

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cb4652e0 2d1c-4d79-bd7c-7a484b458070 on 05 Jul 2020 23:26:19

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

I see this has been planned since March 2016. Any update on this?

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d5eeee7d 054d-4a5f-ac03-33bfb8cc8453 on 05 Jul 2020 23:19:49

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

I was surprised when this didn't work - I would have thought this would be the easiest migration path for people working with SSAS data to move from Excel to Power BI.

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d42aa86c 975d-4a17-9abb-f02e183e8374 on 05 Jul 2020 23:17:43

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

Any progress on this ?

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15108cbd 449e-4534-9fdc-af9212c43d88 on 05 Jul 2020 23:14:08

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

Any update? It's been planned for a while...

With the workbook section of a workspace it would be a great feature if I could connect a workbook to my Power BI model for those scenarios where Excel is the preferred client

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108bdd71 b75d-43f1-9750-59f8331b87db on 05 Jul 2020 23:01:49

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

'+1 absolut missing feature... "Analyse in Excel" is only the half story if you are not able to publish the excel file back to 0365 without "breaking" the refresh-ability

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5da8d7e0 c81e-4069-add3-836748df8b59 on 05 Jul 2020 23:00:51

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

The business case I have for my organisation is to upgrade our Report Server with the PowerBI Report Server version, and to use this as a platform for all our reports. Be it SSRS reports, KPIs, PowerBI reports or Excel reports. I would be able to view all of these in one portal. As of today you have implemented this viewing functionality for PowerBI reports, but you still lack a simple way to view Excel reports. Our end users have to download the excel reports as static files from our report server, which only leads to excel hell. ->> If I could publish the excel reports (that all have SSAS connections) to PowerBI.com and then be able to interact with these excel workbook reports through the Report Server, the same way that I interact with regular PowerBI reports --- Then! I'd have a strong business case. But since this SSAS live connection thing doesn't work, I have zero use for the integration between SSRS, PowerBI and Excel.

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cda9d1ec 00e5-436b-9ff7-3bb3c97096cb on 05 Jul 2020 22:57:10

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

This should also include Excel workbooks connected to datasets in Power BI Service.

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e50074f6 0075-4a9e-9af7-93eeb387a00b on 05 Jul 2020 22:52:27

RE: Add ability for Excel workbooks to have a live connection to SSAS

Any update, a number of organizations have investments in Excel reports which are tied back to SSAS, would be great if Power BI would support these instead of having to port them over to Power BI (which is not as good as Excel for viewing big tables of data)