Power BI Elements¶

With the Power BI Element a Power BI report, dashboard tile or visual can be embedded into the lobby. This feature can be turned off using the system parameter "Comma separated list of disabled features".

Power BI Properties¶

PowerBiLobbyElementScreenshot

Data Properties

Property	Description
Workspace	This property is used to filter the contents of the Report selector. The dropdown shows all the available workspaces the environment has access to. Selecting one will cause the Report selector to only show reports and dashboards contained in the selected workspace. This property does not need to be set before a report or dashboard can be selected. If the Report selector is used first, the Workspace property will auto populate with the workspace which contains the selected report or dashboard.
Report	The name of the report or dashboard to embed. When the Workspace selector is empty, this dropdown will show all the available reports and dashboards the environment has access to. When a workspace has been selected, this dropdown will show all reports and dashboards in that workspace that are accessible. Reports and dashboards can be distinguished by means of the icon used before their entry in the dropdown, and the text in parentheses appended to each label as a suffix. Report Dashboard The reports are requested from the Power BI Service which is reading the reports and dashboards from the Power BI workspace(s) the service principal has access to, normally that would be 1 workspace for a customer. When a report is selected, you can jump to a page where you can edit it by pressing the navigator button (shown behind the Report drop down). For more information on this functionality, see: Power Bi Report Overview.
Page Name (r)	[Optional] Shows all the available pages of the selected Report, when selected the report is opened on this page and the Power BI page tabs will not be shown.
Visual Name (r)	[Optional] Shows the available visuals for the selected page, when selected this visual is shown instead of the page.
Tile (d)	The tile of the dashboard to show.
Overwrite Report Filters (r)	When this toggle is enabled, any report level filters on the chosen report will be removed before the report is embedded. Enabling this will not change the actual report (nothing is saved back to Power BI), only how it is displayed as a lobby element. Note that as this is a change to the filters present on the report, the report will need to be previewed before changes can be seen. This can be done using the Preview button above the preview window.
Date filter (r)	With the date filter the reports date dimension can be linked to page parameters. In the Table and Column columns the table and column of the Power BI Report needs to be specified that contain the date data. The Start Date Mapped To and End Date Mapped To column should contain the value or the page parameter to use for the filter. If a page parameter is used the parameter name should be specified within $ signs, a fixed value should be specified without $ signs. Fixed filters should be written without $'s. It's also possible to use CSV parameters as filter values. These are placed within # characters.
Dimension filters (r)	Dimension filters can be used to add a fixed or dynamic filter to the report. For dynamic filters the filter should be placed within $, this will create a page parameter for the filter. Fixed filters should be written without $'s. It's also possible to use CSV parameters as filter values. These are placed within # characters.

(r) = report only, (d) = dashboard only

The date filter and dimension filters can be tested in the Element Preview section using the parameters button.

Navigator button (report only)

Once a report has been selected, pressing the navigator button will automatically navigate to the Power BI Report Overview. From here, the report can be viewed and edited. Note that this is only possible for reports, this feature is not supported for dashboards.

NavigatorButton

Formatting properties (report only)

Property	Description
Theme	The option selected from this LoV determines which pre-set theme (if any) will be applied to the report or visual as it is embedded. Please see the dedicated section on Setting Report Theme for more info.
Show Visual Headers	When this toggle is enabled, visual header context menues will be available for the visuals in an embedded Power BI report. They can be accessed by hovering the mouse over the visuals on the report. When this is disabled, visual headers will be supressed. These menues are a feature of Power BI itself, this property simply enables or disables them.
Page View Mode	The option selected from this LoV will affect the Power BI Page View that is used when embedding the report into the lobby element. For reports that contain multiple pages, the selected option will apply to all pages. Please see the dedicated section on Page View Mode for more details.

Setting Report Theme (report only)

On the Formatting section of the element designer, the Theme setting can be used to apply one of two hardcoded themes to an embedded Power BI report or visual.

An explanation of each of these options is provided below

IFS Lobby¶

Responds to IFS Cloud Web theme changes: Yes
Responds to Color Style changes: Yes

This option is designed to replicate the look and color palate in use by the other range of lobby elements. Note that this is the default option for all new Power BI lobby elements.

IFS Power BI¶

Responds to IFS Cloud Web theme changes: Yes
Responds to Color Style changes: No

This options is designed to replicate the look and color palate of the IFS Power BI Template, which can be downloaded from the IFS Design System Website.

Use Report Theme¶

Responds to IFS Cloud Web theme changes: No
Responds to Color Style changes: No

This option maintains the theming on the embedded report or visual. It is intended for use cases where the selected report or visual has a specific theming or layout which should be preserved to maintain usability.

How Setting Report Theme Works¶

When an option other than Use Report is selected, the system programmatically changes the background colors of report visuals and the report wallpaper, removes outspace, changes text colors and overwrites the data colors. Due to the way that theme changes are applied in Power BI, it is only possible to override general report level theming. Any theming that has been applied to individual visuals on a Power BI report cannot be changed by this feature (for example, if a single bar chart in a report has been configured to have a white background and red text). Because of this, certain visuals or elements on the report may not respond to theme changes even with this option selected.

For this reason, changing the theme using this setting will not always be a good option for each report or visual.

It's important to note that this setting makes no permanent change to the selected report. Nothing is saved back, the theme changes are only in effect for the lobby element being created.

Page View Mode (report only)

The current available options are as follows. Please note that with the exception of the Use Report Settings option, these options correspond with those currently available in Power BI Desktop.

Option	Description
Fit to Page (Default)	Fit the content horizontally and vertically into the space provided.
Fit to Width	Fit the content horizontally into the space provided only. Note that depending on the canvas size of the report or page being embedded, this may result in vertical scroll bars on the lobby element.
Actual Size	Do not fit the content and preserve its true size. Note that depending on the canvas size of the report or page being embedded, this may result in horizontal and vertical scroll bars on the lobby element.
Use Report Settings	Preserve the Page View settings currently present on the report. This is useful for when a report has been specifically designed for embedding, or when a report contains multiple pages which each have their own Page View settings that should not be interfered with.

Power BI Lobby elements created before the addition of this option were automatically configured to use Fit to Page. This is thus the default value for this setting.

Report data mode (report only)¶

At the moment there is no way to determine if a report is bound to Azure Analysis Service (AAS), SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) or is running in import mode and if it is using Row Level Security (RLS) or not. To be able to render the report correctly this information is needed.

To be able to provide the information that is needed a report designer can use tags in the dataset of the report that indicate the mode of the report in the form of [Mode;{x}] where x should be the number or the code of the table below.

From the current release, Report Data Mode is changed from ‘tag in name’ to ‘tag in parameter’. And the default mode is changed from AasWithRls to ImportWithRls.

Tag in Name: [Mode;{x}]
Tag in Parameter:
- Parameter Name- RlsMode
- Value - Example: ImportWithRls

Therefore, reports that used the previous default mode (AasWithRls) will now need to explicitly specify that the RLS Mode is AasWithRls. This can be done by either adding a tag to the name, or by adding a parameter to the dataset. Otherwise, these reports will default to ImportWithRls.

Mode	Description
(1) SsasWithRls	Report is connected to a SSAS model that is using RLS.
(2) SsasNoRls	Report is connected to a SSAS model without RLS.
(3) AasWithRls	Report is connected to a AAS model that is using RLS.
(4) AasNoRls	Report is connected to a AAS model without RLS.
(5) ImportWithRls	Report is running in import mode with RLS enabled (default).
(6) ImportNoRls	Report is running in import mode without RLS.

There is also [Mode:Streaming] which needs to be added to Streaming Datasets in order for them to be properly identified. When using a streaming dataset, the Table and Column dropdowns in the Date and Dimension filter sections will not be populated.

Role to use (report only)¶

By default the role "EmbedUser" is used, this means that this role needs to be available. If the report is not using this role but another role the role can be specified by using a name tag in the form of [Role;{x}] where {x} needs to be replaced with the role to use.

Uploading and editing reports and dashboards¶

Uploading new reports and dashboards or editing existing reports or dashboards can be done through Microsoft Power BI, for more information see: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/power-bi/

Uploading and editing reports can also be done from within IFS Cloud Web, see: Power Bi Report Overview.

Known Limitations

It's currently not possible to specify date or dimension filters for Power BI reports connected to SQL Sever Analysis Services Datasources running in SSASNoRls or SSASWithRls mode.