Creating data sets to use in reports with a very practical wizard

Source: https://gerardorenteria.blog/2024/04/14/creating-data-sets-to-use-in-reports-with-a-very-practical-wizard-%f0%9f%a7%99%e2%99%82%ef%b8%8f/

You can use following wizard that helps us create data sets that we can use to create reports in Excel, Power BI or another tool that can take an OData web service as a data source.

Let’s go back to the wizard, this is called «Reporting Data Setup» and we access it from the Web Services page, through the «Create Data Set» button.

In this wizard, we have 3 options.

Create a new data set

If we select this option, we must write a name for this new set of data (service name), and the source of the data, which can be a page or a query.

In this example we will select page 89 of Job List (Project List).

On this page we see options such as opening the selected fields in Excel. We can pick and select the fields we want to view. And we can also apply filters and finally publish it.

On the filter page as we see below, we can apply filters to the fields and also by totals. In this example, we are going to filter by the person responsible named «Lina».

If we select the publish option, we see the message that it has been created successfully, with the URL created.

If we select the Excel option, an Excel file is downloaded, when we open the file, we have to click «enable editing».

Then, we can see that the Excel connection with Business Central has been created through the web service, and we visualize the results: the projects where LINA is responsible.

If we want to view the new web service on the Business Central Web Services page, we click on the «reload» option.

We now see the created web service.

As we indicated previously, we can use this web service as a data source for different tools, in this example, we see the results from Postman.

Create a copy of an existing data set

If we select this option, we must first select the web service, the origin of the copy.

We find and select the source web service, in this example, we choose the web service created earlier.

We write the name of the new web service, in this example, we will select another responsible.

Therefore, we will change the filter to a new responsible of projects.

When publishing it, we see it already created in our web service list.

And like the previous case, we view it from Postman.

Edit an existing data set

If we select this option, we must search and select the web service that we want to modify.

We select it. In the case of the example, we will select the last one created.

And we’ll add some additional fields to it.

Like the previous cases, we see the result through Postman, with the new fields added.

In this agile and intuitive way, you can create the necessary data sources for a Power BI report, or any other tool that requires it.