I am unable to refresh table on Excel online

[Saud_Jilani]

I have two workbooks and I have shared the OneDrive folder containing them to an account. It is unable to refresh.
Even though this link clearly shows that excel web can do that:
Power Query data sources in Excel versions - Microsoft Support



Anything that might cause it? I couldn't find any helpful resource online.

 

[Matt Allington]

What do you mean by “table”?
How did you connect to the data from the destination file to the source file? Presumably via power query but what connection type?

 

[Saud_Jilani]

I created a source and destination file on my computer. Then I created a query to the source file. Then I replaced the data source of the query to the online location of the source file instead of the local location, which looks like this:

https://user-my.sharepoint.com/personal/admin_user_onmicrosoft_com/Documents/User/Excel/Online%20query%20experiment/Source.xlsx

I don't know much about the cloud update. In actual, I have a Master file.xlsx, and I want to update a subset file.xlsx using that. It works locally, but it should also update online, and I am not sure how.

 

[Matt Allington]

I created a source and destination file on my computer. Then I created a query to the source file. Then I replaced the data source of the query to the online location of the source file instead of the local location, which looks like this:

https://user-my.sharepoint.com/personal/admin_user_onmicrosoft_com/Documents/User/Excel/Online%20query%20experiment/Source.xlsx

I don't know much about the cloud update. In actual, I have a Master file.xlsx, and I want to update a subset file.xlsx using that. It works locally, but it should also update online, and I am not sure how.

That URL looks like a personal URL for your OneDrive folder. You need load the source into a company group OneDrive folder if you want someone else to be able to refresh the file.

 

[Saud_Jilani]

Do you mean from here? Or what...

 

[Matt Allington]

Or what. If you want someone else to refresh the query using a file on OneDrive, they have to have access to it either in their personal onedrive or you need to ensure the file is in a shared OneDrive. OneDrive is a bit like a file server. There is not "one" OneDrive.

 

[Saud_Jilani]

Or what. If you want someone else to refresh the query using a file on OneDrive, they have to have access to it either in their personal onedrive or you need to ensure the file is in a shared OneDrive. OneDrive is a bit like a file server. There is not "one" OneDrive.

Yes, that's what I did. I shared the entire folder using the method. So they now have access, but still refresh doesn't work.

 

[Matt Allington]

I do not know what the problem is, but I'm not convinced we are talking about the same thing.
There are 3 main forms of OneDrive

• OneDrive Personal. This will not work for what you want to do.
• OneDrive for Business Personal Space. You can share a folder in your OneDrive for Business Personal account/folder, but this will not work either.
• OneDrive for Business Shared Drive/Folders (I don't know what the official name is). This is "operationally" the same as SharePoint. You create a new enterprise wide shared drive/folder that is accessible across your organisation using access control. It is not the same as sharing a folder from your personal OneDrive for Business space. This approach is what you need.

 

[Saud_Jilani]

Thanks, Matt, that's the reason why I was unable to do it. My idea was that if OneDrive is online, and I have shared the entire folder to the other person (with correct query directories) it should work. But OneDrive Personal cannot do it because it does not have the capabilities of Sharepoint.