Power Query: Refer to a Column by Name Stored as a Text Parameter

Power Query: Refer to a Column by Name Stored as a Text Parameter

Power Query is a powerful data transformation and analysis tool that is part of Microsoft Excel and Power BI. It allows you to connect to various data sources, clean and transform the data, and load it into your desired destination. In this article, we will explore how to refer to a column by name using a text parameter in Power Query.

Often, when working with large datasets, you may need to dynamically refer to columns based on user input or other criteria. Power Query provides a flexible way to achieve this by allowing you to store the column name as a text parameter and then refer to it within your query.

Step 1: Create a Text Parameter

The first step is to create a text parameter that will store the column name. To do this, follow the steps below:

1. Open Power Query by selecting the Data tab in Excel and clicking on Get Data.
2. Choose your desired data source and load the data into Power Query.
3. In the Home tab of Power Query, click on Manage Parameters in the External Data group.
4. In the Manage Parameters dialog box, click on New to create a new parameter.
5. Give your parameter a meaningful name, such as ColumnName.
6. Set the Type to Text.
7. Click OK to save the parameter.

Step 2: Refer to the Column by Name

Now that we have created the text parameter, we can refer to the column by its name within the Power Query query. Follow the steps below:

1. Within Power Query, select the column where you want to refer to the column by name.
2. In the Home tab, click on Transform in the Edit Queries group.
3. In the Transform tab, click on Replace Values in the Text Column group.
4. In the Replace Values dialog box, select the column where you want to replace values.
5. In the Value to Find field, enter the following formula: each [ColumnName]
6. In the Replace with field, enter the desired value or formula to replace the values in the selected column.
7. Click OK to apply the changes.

By using the each [ColumnName] formula, Power Query will dynamically replace the column name with the value stored in the ColumnName parameter.

Example: Replacing Values in a Column

Let's consider an example where we have a dataset containing customer information, and we want to replace the values in the City column based on user input. We can achieve this using the steps outlined above:

1. Create a text parameter named ColumnName.
2. Load the data into Power Query.
3. Select the City column.
4. Click on Transform and then Replace Values.
5. Enter each [ColumnName] in the Value to Find field.
6. Enter the desired value or formula in the Replace with field.
7. Click OK to apply the changes.

Now, whenever you change the value of the ColumnName parameter, Power Query will automatically update the values in the City column based on the new parameter value.

Conclusion

Power Query provides a flexible way to refer to a column by name using a text parameter. By following the steps outlined in this article, you can easily replace values in a column based on user input or other criteria. This feature allows for dynamic data transformations and analysis, making Power Query a powerful tool for data manipulation.