PBIP Documenter

Generate comprehensive, bidirectional documentation from Power BI PBIP/TMDL semantic models — instantly, in your browser.

No PBIP file? Try the live demo with Contoso sample data — no setup required, runs entirely in your browser.

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What is PBIP / TMDL?

PBIP (Power BI Project) is a developer-friendly file format introduced in Power BI Desktop that stores your semantic model and reports as plain text files instead of a binary .pbix. It integrates with Git and CI/CD pipelines.

TMDL (Tabular Model Definition Language) is the text-based format within PBIP that describes every table, column, measure, relationship, and role in your semantic model — one .tmdl file per object, readable and diffable in any editor.

If you've enabled "Save as Power BI Project" in Power BI Desktop (Preview → Developer mode), your workspace folder already contains PBIP files ready for this tool.

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Who is this for?

Power BI Developer

You write DAX measures and want to know:

• What tables and columns does each measure reference?
• Where (which pages, which visuals) is each measure displayed?
• Which measures depend on other measures?

What you get: Measure Catalog with full DAX + referenced columns/measures, "Used in Visuals" grouped by page, and measure dependency chains.

Data Engineer

You own the source systems and want to know:

• Which physical tables (e.g. dbo.FactSales) were loaded into the model?
• Were columns renamed between source and model?
• Which DAX measures and report visuals ultimately consume each source table or column?

What you get: Expanded Data Sources view showing physical→model table mapping, column renames detected from Power Query, and a "Where Used" catalog per model column.

Product Owner / Manager

You need the big picture:

• How large is this model? How many measures, tables, visuals, data sources?
• What are the most-used measures and source tables?
• Are there any dynamic features (field parameters, calculation groups) that behave differently than PBIR JSON suggests?

What you get: Executive Summary at the top of every export with model stats, top measures by visual coverage, and top source tables by consumption.

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Quick Start

1. Open the tool: jonathanjihwankim.github.io/pbip-documenter
2. Select your persona (Power BI Developer / Data Engineer / Product Owner) — the app highlights the most relevant section after parsing
3. Click Open Project Folder and select your PBIP project folder
4. The tool auto-discovers .SemanticModel and .Report folders
5. Browse the parsed model in the sidebar — tables, measures, relationships, data sources, visuals, and more
6. Download documentation:
   • Full Report (.html) — self-contained with DAX highlighting, collapsible sections, column usage, data source drill-down
   • Full Report (.md) — clean Markdown with tables, ASCII layout grids, ideal for Git wikis
   • JSON — machine-readable with whereUsed blocks per column and consumers blocks per data source

Manual documentation vs. PBIP Documenter

	Manual	PBIP Documenter
10 tables, 11 measures, 15 visuals	~45 minutes	< 10 seconds
Source → model column lineage	Spreadsheet by hand	Auto-detected from M queries
Visual lineage tracing	Not feasible	Built-in
Relationship diagrams	Draw by hand	Auto-generated SVG
Keeps up with model changes	Start over	Re-run instantly
Privacy	Varies	100% client-side

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What You Get

Point the tool at your PBIP project folder and get professional, bidirectional documentation:

For Power BI Developers (forward view)

• Measure Catalog — DAX expressions with syntax highlighting, display folders, format strings, referenced columns and measures, "Used in Visuals" by page
• Table Inventory — columns with data types, descriptions, sort-by, summarize-by, and hidden status
• Relationships — from/to columns, cardinality, cross-filter direction, active/inactive
• Roles — permission levels and RLS filter expressions per table

For Data Engineers (reverse view)

• Data Sources — expanded view with physical table names (schema + table from Navigation steps), Power Query column renames, computed columns, and full consumer catalog (measures + visuals + pages)
• Column Usage (Where Used) — per table, every visible column shows which measures reference it and which visuals display it
• Source Trace Lineage — click a physical source table to open a forward lineage diagram: source → model table → measures → visuals

For Product Owners (summary view)

• Executive Summary — model stats at a glance: tables, measures, relationships, pages, visuals, data sources, dynamic features, broken references
• Top Measures — ranked by number of visuals they appear in
• Top Source Tables — ranked by downstream visual coverage
• Dynamic Features — field parameters and calculation groups that PBIR JSON doesn't fully represent

Interactive Diagrams

• Relationship Diagram — SVG with pan, zoom, and zoom-to-fit; star-schema layout
• Visual Lineage — full model, visual trace, measure impact, column impact, and source trace modes
• Visual Usage Diagram — field-to-visual mapping

Export

• HTML — fully self-contained, embeds CSS + SVG, DAX syntax highlighting, collapsible sections, table of contents
• Markdown — clean document with fenced DAX blocks, ASCII page layout grids, and structured tables
• JSON — machine-readable with whereUsed and consumers blocks for downstream tooling

Your files never leave your browser. All parsing happens client-side — nothing is uploaded anywhere.

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Browser Support

Requires the File System Access API:

Browser	Support
Chrome 86+	✅ Supported
Edge 86+	✅ Supported
Opera 72+	✅ Supported
Firefox	❌ Not supported
Safari	❌ Not supported

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PBIP Folder Structure

The tool expects a standard PBIP project layout:

Show folder structure

MyProject/
├── MyProject.SemanticModel/
│   └── definition/
│       ├── database.tmdl
│       ├── model.tmdl
│       ├── relationships.tmdl
│       ├── expressions.tmdl        (optional — shared M expressions / parameters)
│       ├── tables/
│       │   ├── Sales.tmdl
│       │   ├── Product.tmdl
│       │   └── ...
│       └── roles/                  (optional)
│           └── Reader.tmdl
└── MyProject.Report/               (optional — enables visual analysis)
    └── definition/
        └── pages/
            └── Page1/
                ├── page.json
                └── visuals/
                    └── visual1/
                        └── visual.json

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Also by Jihwan Kim

Tool	Description
PBIR Visual Manager	Manage isHiddenInViewMode and visual properties in PBIR reports
PBIP Impact Analyzer	Analyze what breaks when you change a measure, column, or table
PBIP Documenter	Generate bidirectional documentation from TMDL (you are here)

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Support Development

This tool is free forever — built and maintained solo by Jihwan Kim (Microsoft MVP). If PBIP Documenter saves you even 30 minutes of documentation work, please consider sponsoring.

Sponsor Tiers

Tier	Amount	Recognition
Gold	50+ EUR/mo	Logo + link on README and app footer
Silver	10+ EUR/mo	Name + link on README + shoutout in release notes
Bronze	Monthly supporter	Name + link on README
Coffee	One-time	Name listed in Hall of Sponsors

Hall of Sponsors

Name	Tier
Alessandro Tiberti Bertin	Bronze

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License

MIT — Jihwan Kim

Built for: Power BI · Microsoft Fabric · PBIP · PBIR · TMDL · Semantic Models · DAX · Data Governance · CI/CD · Developer Tools