Power Query - Cannot Import Data from Report2Web

Question

"Report2Web is a Web-based enterprise report distribution, archival and retrieval solution that allows users to access critical business documents using a standard Web browser."

I have historical reports that are generated daily from Oracle and loaded in Report2Web (R2W). I would like to import the data from the latest report via Power Query. The reports are stored on R2W as .xls files.

I am able to generate a link to the latest version of the uploaded report (in the browser this link is for a direct file download):
http://NETWORK/r2wlogon/land?c=r2W_COMPANY&r=REPORT_NUMBER&page=3&latest=true

In Power Query, "Get File from Web" does not import the data in this file. PQ seems to pull headers from the website and not the file. The message in the screenshots of "Retrieving info.." never renders data and the column headings are not the headings in the file. It looks like PQ is taking data from the webpage, not the file stored on the webpage.

Does anyone know how I can get the data from this file into PQ without having to download it each day? I have tried to get data From File, From Database and a few others and none work out.

Answer 1

I'm not familiar with this system and it doesn't appear to be listed in the list of official connectors for Power Query.

Are you positive that the link is for a direct download of the file? Usually that sort of file contains the file extension in the url.

My best guess is that this is not a direct download link, but a link that executes a javascript, depending on the browser, to later download the file on demand with some sort of token or some other type of authentication. You can validate this hypothesis by checking your network traffic with something like Fiddler to see exactly what happens when you reach that webpage.