Generate User-specific PDFs from Power BI with Dynamic Slicer and Filter Selection

Last updated: June 5, 2023

Use BI Helper’s Automated Filter and Slicer input to dynamically select slicer and filter values from Power BI and generate a PDF for each value.

In this tutorial, we will set up a process to automate the generation of PDFs for a set of dynamic slicer or filter values in a Power BI report. For every report run, BI Helper will auto-read the slicer / filter values from a Power BI table visual and generate a PDF for each value.

First page of Power BI report

We will illustrate this using the Retail Sales Report in Power BI.

Prerequisites:

1. [Power BI] On the first page of your PBIX file, create a table visual titled Filters and Contacts with four columns having the following headers:
   - Filter Value: The filter / slicer values to be applied
   - TO: email recipients
   - CC: email recipients
   - BCC: email recipients
2. The values in these columns are to be read from your Power BI report data model.
3. Publish your PBIX to Power BI Service.

The above 4 columns are mandatory. Multiple email IDs in the TO, CC and BCC columns need to be separated by “;”.

You can hide the first page of the Power BI report with the Filters and Contacts table so that it is not included in the generated PDF.

Important: Filters and Contacts is the Title of the table visual, not the Header.

A table on the first page of your Power BI report with the columns mentioned above

Steps:

1. [BI Helper] Register on BI Helper and create a new job by following steps 1–3 of this tutorial.
2. Go to the ‘Apply Filters, Slicers and Email IDs’ section in the Generate PDF tab and select the Automated input mode.

3. Specify the Filter and Slicer Input. Please follow this link for information on the filter or slicer name format. For example, the District Manager Slicer in the Retail Sales Report is to be defined as District Manager<>Store/DM.

4. Enter Filters and Contacts in the Source Visual box.

5. Save the job and run or schedule it. When the job runs, BI Helper will download the filter / slicer values from the visual, generate PDFs for each of the values and email it to the To, CC and BCC mail IDs.

Note: You can define multiple slicer and filter combinations in the first column of the Filters and Contacts table in BI Helper.

Please refer to our product documentation for details.

BI Helper

BI Helper bihelper.tech is a simple, secure and scalable SaaS solution for PDF report distribution in Power BI and Tableau. With just one Power BI Pro / Tableau Online license, you can generate and share PDF reports with users within and outside your organization.

Resource: https://medium.com/bi-helper