User Guide

Before you start

To be able to use Power BI Connector for ServiceNow users should be assigned to specific roles by ServiceNow System Admin. If you don’t have access to the connector, please contact your System Admin and request to assign any of the following roles: Power BI Connector for ServiceNow: User roles.

Depending on roles assigned, users can access Power BI Connector from

• Platform UI Instance-Name.service-now.com/

• Service Portal main page Instance-Name.service-now.com/sp

• Power BI Connector page Instance-Name.service-now.com/pbi_connector

How to create a data source in ServiceNow?

To create a Data Source, user should have PBI ADMIN or PBI EDITOR role.

From the Service Portal Instance-Name.service-now.com/sp:

Scroll down and find Data Sources table.

Click New button.

or

From the Power BI Connector pageInstance-Name.service-now.com/pbi_connector:

Click New button.

Fill in

• Data Source name - any descriptive and short name

• Descripton (optional) - any additional details about data source if needed

• Set Rows limit - the numer of row imported into the Power BI, leave blank (by default) to export without limit

• Set Use field labels for column names - set checkbox to allow change column Names in export results to Labels

Check the Disable editing for other users allows restricting data source editing for those who is not creator or not ServiceNow Admin.

Option is not selected by default and it means that any user can edit the data source.

If option is checked, but no Groups are selected it means that only Owner and ServiceNow Admin can edit the data source.

Selecting Group(s) of users will allow the editing of data source for all group members.

To add tables, click Add Source button and start to type the table name in the Select table field. Or alternatively, find the table from the list by scrolling the list down.

As soon as table is selected, click Add button. By default table fields are not selected, no filter is set and Use display value switchers (global and for each fields). Include any amount of tables and fields in your Data Source.

After adding the table, select the fields needed for the reports. Export any ServiceNow tables and fields (including Custom tables and fields).

Set Use display value as turn on if need export data in String format

To narrow down export results, a filter can be applied to the tables.

To configure a filter, click Filter icon and configure the conditions.

Add conditions and click on Run button. Filter is set.

In some cases, it can be a table that contains fields as a Reference type. Click on the “+“ icon and, in opened dialog, select referenced fields that need to be exported. Click OK to close the dialog.

NOTE: It became possible to export not only parent-field but also child fields from Power BI Connector version 1.3.0. For more details, navigate to Use a dot-walking mechanism to export Reference type data

To save the data source, click the Save button at the end of the page.

How to import data into Microsoft Power BI?

From the Power BI Connector page Instance-Name.service-now.com/pbi_connector:

Scroll down and find Data Sources table.

Find the data source in the list using Search functionality. Pay attention that search is possible by Name or Description.

From the Power BI Connector page Instance-Name.service-now.com/pbi_connector:

Find the data source in the list using Show Matching or Filter Out filters.

Right-click on the data source to open the menu. Click Copy OData feed URL.

Or use direct Copy action next to each data source.

In the Power BI Desktop

• Click Get Data

• Select OData feed

• Insert copied URL

• Click OK

In opened window

• Switch to the Basic authentication

• Enter your ServiceNow credentials

• Click Connect

In Navigator preview

• Select tables for loading by checking the checkboxes

• Click Load

The import process will start. As soon as it’s done the user can start to build dashboards based on imported ServiceNow data.