Microsoft Power Bi and RENXT

Prue Jones
Prue Jones
Sixth Anniversary
in SKY Developer General Discussions
I have a question regarding connecting to Microsoft PowerBI from RENXT

-User is trying to connect to Microsoft PowerBI

-The only option I see for doing this is in RENXT control panel > applications> SQL Access™ Connector for Custom Reporting Mission BI

-User enabled this but still does not see an option to 'get data' from RENXT in MSPowerBI

Is there another part of the set up we are missing?

Comments

  • William da Silva
    William da Silva
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant
    Hi Prue,


    There are various options / ways to connect Power BI to RE NXT, all of which require some technical setup.


    Send me a personal message, I can walk you through our managed solution that makes getting to Power BI easy.


    Thanks,

    William
  • Carol Grant
    Carol Grant
    Seventh Anniversary Kudos 5 First Reply Name Dropper
    This brings up the issue that Blackbaud was going to partner with Microsoft and create a connector to Power BI.  I am still waiting for this and I think I'm in the Early Adopter for it.  I've setup an API connection but now it doesn't work.  Dealing with static Excel files and refreshing them is not very efficient.


    Carol Grant

    Middlebury College

    College Advancement
  • Patrick Clancy
    Patrick Clancy
    Fifth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant
    I have used a custom connector to connect RENXT and Power BI, but it isn't a particularly elegant solution.

    Ideally, I would like to use SQL Server Management Studio or suchlike to create tables from the data and use Power BI to connect to those, but this doesn't seem possible with NXT.
  • Karen Potter
    Karen Potter
    Fifth Anniversary Facilitator 1

    i would like to know how to do this. i created sky api but wont authenticate oauth. i have been digging for solutions for over a year. please help.

  • William da Silva
    William da Silva
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant

    Hi Karen,

    I can understand your frustrations.

    I have an “easy button” for you! You can find Charity Automator on the BB marketplace (link below). With Charity Automator, you can easily connect Power BI to an SQL database that is kept in Sync with your RE NXT (and FE NXT and Luminate Online).

    https://app.blackbaud.com/marketplace/applications/8075c905-eacb-49cf-9843-d65982ae9bd0?envid=p-NJOUk1eRo0ex-DWjAz9CGg

    You can reach out to me directly for more information.

    Thanks,

    William

  • Ben Regier
    Ben Regier
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 5 Name Dropper Participant

    Karen, have you watched Linton Myers' video showing how to set up the connector? I think he does a good job of making it clear and easy to follow.

  • April Kulpa
    April Kulpa
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1
    Great video! Is this available for FENXT too?
  • Eileen Wallwork
    Eileen Wallwork
    Seventh Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    Ho Ben. Agreed, the video is great. But I wish he went a little further. For ex, can you create a list in NXT and access it in PowerBi? I haven't been able to figure this out. Is there a video that picks up where he left off? Now that you made the connection, how do you use it? Thanks! Eileen

  • Sheree Norton
    Sheree Norton
    Ninth Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Participant

    Is there a Power BI for Sky Blackbaud Grantmaking?

  • Ben Regier
    Ben Regier
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 5 Name Dropper Participant

    @Eileen Wallwork, yes, you can access public and private RENXT Constituent and Gift lists within Power BI.

    Once you have the connection set up, you can go to Get Data > Other > Search for “Blackbaud” and connect.

    Once that connection is made, you'll see all the endpoints you have access to. Under the “Constituents” folder are folders for public and private lists. Same thing in the Gifts folder.

    It's true that just getting the data into Power BI is only the first of many steps needed to make a useful report, and I've often found that a key piece of data I need for my report is buried within an object within a column, so you may have to do some data manipulation and transformation before you can use it the way you want to in your reports.

    As with many things these days, YouTube can be a pretty valuable resource. The Guy in a Cube channel has useful videos for getting started, and once you know more about what you need to learn, you can find many other useful channels as well.

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