HammerTech provides a version of the Power BI templates with Incremental Refresh pre-configured for clients to use in Power BI Service. This enables efficient handling of large datasets by limiting how much data is refreshed at a time.

HammerTech Default Power BI Template Configuration

The HammerTech Incremental Refresh template is pre-configured with:

Archive Period – 5 years (data older than this is not stored)
Refresh Window – 1 year prior to today (only this window is refreshed on each update)

This setup works for most client scenarios but can be adjusted as needed.

How to edit Incremental Refresh settings within the Power BI Template

Follow these steps if you need to change the archive or refresh windows.

1. Open the template in Power BI Desktop

2. Locate and select the table you want to edit that has Incremental Refresh enabled on the right hand side panel

3. Right click on the data table and select Incremental Refresh

4. Adjust the refresh and archive periods in the dialog box

Set the archive window (how far back you want to keep historic data)
Set the refresh window (how recent the data window should be refreshed)

5. Apply and save changes

6. Save the PBIX file and publish it to Power BI Service

Important note: On first publish, Power BI will perform a full refresh (both archive & incremental). After that, only the incremental window is refreshed.