Rules / Error Prevention

Avoid invalid characters in descriptions

error AVOID_INVALID_DESCRIPTION_CHARACTERS · ported · scope: Table, Measure, Hierarchy, Level, Perspective, Partition, Column, CalculatedColumn, CalculatedTable, CalculatedTableColumn, Role, CalculationGroupTable, CalculationItem

What it checks

Descriptions containing a control character other than whitespace. Tabs and line breaks are allowed.

Why it matters

A control character in a description is invisible in Power BI Desktop and fails the deployment: the service rejects the metadata and the publish stops with an error that names no object. Finding the character by eye is close to impossible.

How to fix it

Retype the description in Desktop, or remove the character from the /// comment lines above the object in the TMDL file. A text editor that shows invisible characters makes it easy to spot.

Quirks

• In practice this rule cannot fire on a project loaded from TMDL files, because the format does not carry these characters. It is kept so that models built by other means are covered.

Links

• https://github.com/microsoft/Analysis-Services/blob/master/BestPracticeRules/BPARules.json

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