MicrosoftQuick question related to "Q: Can I receive new responses without opening my workbook? What if I have a Power Automate Flow based on the data sync?"
Say I have a Power BI report that relies on data from multiple Forms to Excel sheets stored in SharePoint. The Power BI report runs a scheduled refresh every morning. Is the scheduled refresh via Power BI sufficient to display the newest data from the Excel sheets? Or do I have to set up an automated flow that opens up and refreshes all data for every single Excel file prior to the scheduled refresh?
Fingers crossed..
Hi Christoffer,
Unfortunately, in my experience, no, that will not be sufficient--Power BI's scheduled refresh will only be able to access whatever data was loaded to the sheet the last time you actually opened it (which defeats the purpose of a scheduled refresh, in this case). The new sync solution is more or less a Schrödinger's Spreadsheet, where the data only "exists" to other automated services like Power BI and Power Automate if you have opened and viewed the spreadsheet to manually trigger a resync.
If you identify a good solution in Power Automate for opening and refreshing an Excel file, please share on this thread, as I'm sure several of us will find that to be a useful workaround until the above limitation is (hopefully) addressed.
Thanks!
Schrödinger's Spreadsheet!
See my reply in this thread on Sep 30. Instructions for power automate to refresh the spreadsheet.
That's another scenario. We fill / update some Excel file with Form responses using Power Automate with mapping Excel table on Form questions. Not sync the file without opening it.
That will be great if such workaround exists. However, to my knowledge Power Automate doesn't open the file, and Refresh All script doesn't update form responses. If only Power Automate for Desktop or PowerShell.
