Introduction¶
The MetaMiner Client (MMC) shows the Power BI and Fabric metadata that the MetaMiner Server (MMS) collected from your tenant, and lets you act on it from one desktop window.
How it works¶
The MMS collects metadata from each Power BI environment (one Microsoft tenant) with the Microsoft Entra ID app you registered, and stores it in the MetaMiner Database (MMDB). The client connects to the MMS port, downloads a snapshot of each environment you load, and builds its trees from that snapshot.
flowchart LR
MS[Power BI, Fabric and Microsoft Graph APIs] -->|app registration| MMS[MetaMiner Server]
MMS --> MMDB[(MetaMiner Database)]
MMC[MetaMiner Client] -->|49714| MMS
MMC -.->|optional Microsoft sign-in| ENTRA[Microsoft Entra ID]Browsing, filtering, impact analysis and the security matrix work on collected data. They do not call Microsoft while you work, so they are fast and do not count against Microsoft API limits.
A few actions work on the live tenant instead: managing workspace access, restoring a deleted workspace, exporting .pbix files, backup and restore, and exporting results to a Fabric lakehouse. These need extra setup and, for most of them, a Microsoft sign-in in the client.
What you can do¶
| Task | Where | Needs |
|---|---|---|
| Browse workspaces, apps, reports, dashboards, semantic models, dataflows and Fabric items | Power BI Explorer | A loaded Power BI environment |
| Trace what depends on what | Impact Analysis | Collected data only |
| See who can access which items | Security Matrix | View Security permission |
| See activity on an item | View > View Activities in Object Actions | View Activities permission; activity events collected |
| Browse Entra users, groups and licenses | Entra Users and Groups, Licenses | Tenant Admin permission; Microsoft Graph data collected |
Download reports as .pbix |
Export PBIX Files | The MetaMiner app has access to the workspace |
| Add, change or remove workspace members | Manage Workspace Access | Power BI sign-in in the client |
| See every workspace in the tenant | Tenant Admin View | Power BI sign-in and Tenant Admin permission |
| Restore a deleted workspace | Restore Deleted Workspaces | Tenant Admin View; your Microsoft account is a Fabric administrator |
| Back up and restore content | Backup and Restore | See that chapter |
| Query the MMDB with SQL | Meta Query | Tab: Meta Query permission and a license edition that includes it |
Key terms¶
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Environment | One Power BI tenant configured in the MetaMiner Administrator (MMA) |
| Snapshot | The copy of an environment's metadata that the client downloads from the MMS |
| Power BI sign-in | An optional Microsoft sign-in in the client, turned on by your administrator, that lets live actions run as your own Microsoft account |
| Semantic model | Power BI's current name for a dataset. Some client filters and graph labels still say "Dataset" |
| Fabric item | Any non-Power BI item in a workspace, such as a lakehouse, warehouse, notebook or pipeline, listed by its type |