Michelle on 30 Aug 2016 01:51:44
When a user tries to schedule a data set for Excel refresh, the power bi website looks for the gateways set up with the data sources having same Excel paths. Even though it might sound convenient for the users, it creates lots of headache for administration. For example, I had machine crashed and rebuilt and the original gateway lost, or multiple gateways shows the same path in my attempt to recover.
How about we allow the user to specify one gateway specifically and do not match the gateway behind the scene to decide what gateway to show and what not to show. The bottom line is that we need to give administrators concrete steps to trace where it fails. The auto detection of path disallows that tracing.
A truly better way is to allow a dashboard user to refresh Excel data in the backend directly. Database connection does not require a gateway, so why Excel connection has to have one. Please contact me if you need to discuss.