Overview
In this article, we will discuss the following.
- Definition of Gateway
- Prerequisites to Configure Power BI Gateway
- Important Points before we start Installation of Data Gateway
- Two Modes of Gateway Installation
- Personal Mode
- Recommended Mode (Enterprise Mode)
- Difference between Personal Mode and Recommended Mode
What do we mean by Data Gateway?
- A Gateway is a software which will provide a facility to connect our on-premise data sources (like SQL Server, SharePoint and many more) with online services like Power BI.
- A gateway acts as a Gatekeeper.
- Gateway listens to requests from client and grant access only if authentication is successful.
- A gateway uses encryption to store sensitive information like passwords.
- A gateway will encrypt and compress all the data to pass through it.
Prerequisites to Configure Power BI Gateway
Before we start the installation of Power BI Gateway, we need to consider the following prerequisites.
Minimum System Requirements
| .Net Framework | Minimum 4.5 |
| Operating System | 64 – bit Windows 7 / Windows Server 2008 R2 or later |
Recommended System Requirements
| CPU | 8 Core |
| RAM | 8 GB |
| Operating System | 64 -bit Windows Server 2008 R2 or later |
Important Points before we Start Gateway Installation
- It is not feasible to install Gateway on Domain Controller machine.
- We cannot install a gateway on a computer, such a laptop, that may be turned off, asleep, or not connected to the internet.
- We can install a gateway on 64- bit machine only.
- We can install up to two on-premise gateway in a single machine. (One for Personal Mode and one for Recommended Mode)
- We cannot install more than one gateway running on the same mode on the same commuter.
Ex
We cannot install two Personal mode gateways on a single machine or we cannot install two Recommended mode gateways on a single machine.
- For Personal mode, we can install and configure one on-premise gateway for one Power BI user.
Ex
If I have installed one gateway with Personal Mode on Machine 1 with user “Jack", now, if I install gateway with Personal Mode on Machine 2 with same user “Jack”, it will not be allowed or it will take the most recent installation setting of machine 2.
- For Recommended mode, we can configure more than one on-premise gateways with a single user. We can manage all the gateways using Power BI Online Services.
Two Modes of Gateway Installation
Power BI provides two modes of Gateway when we install Gateway.
- Personal Mode
- Recommended Mode
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Now let’s elaborate on each term in detail.
Personal Mode
Let’s take a real-life scenario. Suppose you have a large Excel file, One SQL SERVER database, and one Oracle database. You are the only one who is responsible to use data source and prepare Power BI report. You don’t want to share this thing with anyone other in an organization. At that time, you can go with the Personal Mode.
- Allow single user to connect to the data source
- Sharing of Data source is not allowed.
- Can be used with Power BI Online.
Recommended Mode
Let’s take a real-life scenario. Suppose you have different data sources, like Large Excel file, SQL Server, and Oracle data source. Now, you want to share the same data source with all your vendors, people from an organization. At that time, you can go with Recommended or Enterprise Mode.
- Allow multiple users to connect to the data source.
- Can be used with – Power BI, Power Apps, Flow and Azure Logic Apps.
Difference between Personal Mode and Recommended Mode for Gateway Installation
Now, let’s check the difference between Personal Mode and Enterprise (Recommended) Mode.
| Personal Mode | Enterprise (Recommended) Mode |
| Sharing is not allowed | Sharing is allowed |
| Best for single user | Best when you want to share data source with Organization |
| Only use with Power BI | We can use it with – Power BI, Power Apps, Flow, Azure Logic |
Conclusion
This is how we can get started with Data Gateway in Power BI. In my next articles, we will talk about the installation process of Data Gateway with Personal Mode and Recommended Mode.