Power Platform Community Forum Thread Details

Hello,

Inquiring what the general difference is between Connections and Dataflows within PowerApps environment settings. I am specifically looking at the SFTP option which exists in Connections but not in Dataflows - ideally, I would want to use a file within an SFTP server as my data source, and a new file to be provided daily/weekly etc. I realize there is the option to use PowerAutomate to make a copy of the file from the SFTP to a SharePoint which would allow the use of Dataflows, but curious on the difference between both methods.

Thank you

Categories:

Building Power Apps

Hi @Pmocha

We need to undertsand what a Data Connection is and a dataflow.

Data Connection

Most Power Apps apps use external information called Data Sources that is stored in cloud services. A common example is a table in an Excel file stored in OneDrive for Business. Apps are able to access these data sources by using Connections.

The most common type of data source is the table, which you can use to retrieve and store information. You can use connections to data sources to read and write data in Microsoft Excel workbooks, Microsoft Lists, SQL tables, and many other formats, which can be stored in cloud services like OneDrive for Business, DropBox, and SQL Server.

There are other kinds of data sources that aren't tables, such as email, calendars, twitter, and notifications.

(https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-apps/maker/canvas-apps/add-manage-connections)

Dataflow

Dataflows are used to extract, transform, and load data to a storage destination where it can be leveraged for different scenarios. Because not all storage destinations share the same characteristics, some dataflow features and behaviors differ depending on the storage destination the dataflow loads data into. Before you create a dataflow, it's important to understand how the data is going to be used, and choose the storage destination according to the requirements of your solution. (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-query/dataflows/understanding-differences-between-analytical-standard-dataflows)

So Dataflow only supports the ETL process but connections you have the possibility to read and write data.

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