P6-Reporter to Power BI - An Enterprise Architecture Upgrade from Gateway-Only to Fabric-Ready

Who this is for: Teams running Primavera P6 software with project data generated by P6-Reporter and stored in a self-hosted Oracle database, who want to light up Power BI—and now also Microsoft Fabric—without re-platforming their core systems.

Executive Summary

We’ve upgraded our analytics architecture from a single lane (Gateway → Power BI) to a multi-lane, Fabric-ready highway. The result: the same trusted P6-Reporter data, now consumable through Fabric Warehouse in addition to the classic Gateway path. That means more flexibility for your BI teams, better governance options, and a clearer path to scale—without changing how P6-Reporter creates data.

Before → After (at a Glance).

Before: Oracle (on‑prem) → On‑premises Data Gateway → Power BI Service
After: Oracle (on‑prem) → Gateway + Data Pipelines → Fabric Warehouse → Power BI Service
Why this matters: You can keep your P6-Reporter-powered database as is, and choose the most suitable consumption pattern—classic Gateway refresh or Fabric’s cloud data layer—project by project.

Why Call it an Architecture Upgrade?

• Choice, not churn. We add a Fabric lane alongside your existing Gateway lane. No forced migration; pick what’s right for each report.
• A governed cloud data layer. Fabric Warehouse offers a central SQL endpoint for modeling and reuse across many Power BI datasets.
• Operational resilience. Pipelines orchestrate loads (full + incremental), isolate failures, and align refresh with business cadence.
• Future-proofing. A stepping-stone to Lakehouse, notebooks/ML, and enterprise-grade data engineering—whenever you’re ready.

Key point: P6-Reporter remains the authoritative producer of your Oracle Primavera P6 snapshot data. Fabric simply gives you another first-class, online cloud-native way to serve it to Power BI.

The P6-Reporter Context

• What P6-Reporter does: Automates snapshots and curated structures from Primavera P6 so that project teams can track progress and changes, gather resource productivity, and see trends without wrestling with raw P6.
• Where the data lives: In your self-hosted Database—close to your operational systems and security controls.
• What’s new today: In addition to the classic connection, you can now sync those same P6-Reporter tables into Fabric Warehouse and point Power BI at a SQL endpoint in the Microsoft Azure cloud.

Target Architecture After the Upgrade

1. Database (on-prem): P6-Reporter data lives here.
2. On-premises Data Gateway: secure outbound bridge.
3. Fabric Data Pipelines: copy/sync (full + incremental).
4. Fabric Warehouse: governed SQL endpoint for BI.
5. Power BI: reports & semantic models published to the Service.

End-to-End Walkthrough

0) Prerequisites

• Workspace bound to Fabric F-capacity.
• On-premises Data Gateway (standard mode) online with the P6-Reporter data source configured; connection test passing.
• Access rights: Workspace Admin/Member, permission to use the Gateway data source.
• Power BI Desktop that supports Get Data → Microsoft Fabric → Warehouses.

1) Create a Fabric Warehouse

• In your Fabric-backed workspace, go to New → Warehouse (e.g., P6_Reporter_WH).

In your workspace, click on the “New item” button and choose “Warehouses”.



Name it and then you will get a Warehouse.

2) Pipeline: Copy P6-Reporter Database → Warehouse

• New → Data pipeline

Get back to your workspace and click the “New item” button again. This time, we will choose the “Pipeline”.



Name it, then you will get a pipeline. Let’s choose “Copy data assistant” to start.

• Copy job:

You may get the dialog to “Use Copy job”. Let’s choose “Yes, switch to Copy job“.

• Source:

When choosing data source, you would choose the On-premises Data Gateway that you have already have. It should be displayed there.

• Choose data:

Choose the P6-Reporter tables that you want to copy, or provide a query.

• Destination:

Set the data destination to the warehouse that you just created.

• Job mode:

Choose the job mode here. Let’s just choose the Full copy.

• Mapping:

You can configure the map to destination.

• Save:

Review and save your configuration.

• Connection:

Set the connection for your job, selecting the job you just created.



Switch to Settings and select “Browse all” for Connection.



Make a new one if you don’t have it already.



You may need to sign in first.



Remember to check the last option: “This connection can be used with on-premises data gateways and VNet data gateways.”



You are all set!



Run the pipeline and wait for it to complete.

• Quick validation:

You can validate your data when you come back to your warehouse.

3) Build a Power BI Report on the Warehouse

• In Power BI Desktop: Get Data → Microsoft Fabric → Warehouses.

• Pick your Warehouse and the freshly loaded tables.

• Choose a connection/storage mode:
  • Import for compact models and offline analysis.
  • DirectQuery for near-real-time reads against Warehouse.
  • Direct Lake (if available for your scenario).
• Model relationships, author DAX measures, design visuals.

4) Publish & Refresh

• Publish the PBIX to the same workspace for simpler governance.
• Import models: configure dataset refresh (no on-prem Gateway needed now—the source is Warehouse).
• DirectQuery/Direct Lake: typically minimal dataset refresh; ensure the Pipeline cadence keeps Warehouse current.

FAQs & Field Notes: P6-Reporter to Fabric

Does this replace the Gateway?

• No. The Gateway remains essential to move on-prem database into Fabric. What changes is its purpose—from serving report refreshes directly to feeding Fabric.

Any suggestions regarding incremental loads from Oracle to Fabric Warehouse?

• Use a reliable watermark (timestamp or monotonically increasing ID). Start with a full load; then switch to incremental with upsert semantics.

Any suggestions in terms of data types and naming when moving from Oracle to Warehouse?

• Check number precision (e.g., NUMBER(38, x)), timestamps/time zones, and reserved words. Normalize casing and schemas in the Warehouse.

What Stays the Same (And Why That’s Good)

• P6-Reporter continues producing the curated Primavera P6 analytics that your teams rely on.
• P6-Reporter database remains your system of record.
• Power BI continues as the visualization layer.

What’s upgraded: The middle of the stack—a Fabric Warehouse layer—adds scale, reuse, and enterprise data engineering without disrupting how P6-Reporter works.

Where This Takes You Next

• Add a Lakehouse lane for large or semi-structured data.
• Expose Warehouse tables across multiple semantic models.
• Enrich P6-Reporter data with ERP/CMMS sources using Fabric pipelines.

If your organization runs Primavera P6 and wants clearer, faster, and more governable reporting, P6-Reporter gives you the curated data layer—and now Fabric gives you another powerful way to deliver it in Power BI.