Data Not Refreshing When Using SharePoint-Based Excel Data Sources

Issue

When you try to refresh Excel or Access data sources that are stored on SharePoint, the data in the view on Tableau Server might not reflect the current data in the data source.

Environment

Tableau Server
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Access
Microsoft SharePoint

Resolution

The following troubleshooting steps might solve the issue:

Ensure that the Excel file is hosted on an on-premise Sharepoint site (rather than a cloud based site such as Office 365) and that the file is stored on the SharePoint local file system.
Verify that Tableau Desktop uses the UNC path to connect to the data source.
Note: A UNC path is the full name of a resource, directory, or file on a network. It conforms to the \\servername\sharename\directory\filename syntax, where servername is the name of the server and sharename is the name of the shared resource, and directory\filename is the directory path. For example, the following text file D:\datasource.xlsx would have the following UNC path: \\workstation1\d$\datasource.xlsx, where"workstation1" is the full computer name.
Ensure that the Tableau Server Run As User account has access to the UNC path. For more information, see Run As User in the Tableau knowledge base.
Download and install the Microsoft Access Database Engine 2007 driver from the Drivers & Activation page.

Cause

When you connect to SharePoint documents using a URL path, Tableau Desktop places a copy of the data source in the temp directory. This file does not update when the original file changes.