External data files used by Portfolio Slicer Reports (Excel and Power BI)

Overview

Portfolio Slicer Excel and Power BI reports rely on several external data files that are placed in a preconfigured location. These reports do not directly access your PortfolioSlicer-Source.xlsx file or any other source workbook.

These files supply all data needed by the data model in Excel or Power BI to calculate your investments at any point in time.

Typical Folder Location

In a standard setup, these files are stored in the folder:

C:\PortfolioSlicer\PSData\

When you execute a .bat file, it starts PowerShell scripts that delete the existing files and then create new files in this folder.

We do not recommend changing the default location. If, for any reason, you need to change the location, you will need to:

1. Update the PSDataExtract\Scripts\psConfig.txt file, parameter PSDataFolder, and specify the new folder there.
2. In the Portfolio Slicer Excel report workbook, change the external data location.
3. If you are using Power BI, you will also need to change the connection.

The Files Loaded into Portfolio Slicer reports

The files that are loaded into Portfolio Slicer reports are:

• Account.csv
• Allocation.csv
• CompareTo.csv
• Config.csv
• CurrencyConv.csv
• Dates.csv
• Dividends.csv
• Quotes.csv
• Report.csv
• ReportCurrency.csv
• schema.ini
• Symbol.csv
• SymbolAllocation.csv
• SymbolSector.csv
• Transactions.csv
• TransactionsInExcel.csv
• TransType.csv

All .csv files are data files - they contain actual data about specific Portfolio Slicer objects. The schema.ini file is a static file that defines the format of each .csv file.

All .csv files use TAB as the column separator. This is done because comma separators could not be used reliably in all locales. For example, in North America a number is usually written as xxx.xx, but in Europe the same number may be written as xxx,xx. In PSDataExtract\Scripts\psConfig.txt there is a parameter called DecimalSeparator. By default, the value for this parameter is set to .. If you are using Portfolio Slicer in Europe, you will need to change this parameter to ,. With that change, all created .csv files will convert numeric values to xxx,xx format so they can be loaded into Excel with European locale settings without issues.

Special file error.txt

Any time you run a .bat file that updates files in this folder, the very last PowerShell script to run is PSDataExtract\Scripts\psCheckFiles.ps1. This script reviews all extracted files and checks whether the data in those files is consistent.

If the script finds no issues, then no error.txt file is created.

If any issues are found, then the file error.txt is created and information about the issues is written into it.

Important - any time you see an issue in Portfolio Slicer reports, the first thing you should do is check the C:\PortfolioSlicer\PSData\ folder for the error.txt file. If that file exists, you should read its contents and address any reported issues.

After a successful load, you should not see an error.txt file in this folder.

Why These Files Matter

If any of these files are missing, malformed, or inconsistent with your workbook data, Portfolio Slicer may:

• fail to refresh
• show missing holdings or values
• calculate incorrect multi-currency results

Practical Checks

Before troubleshooting the workbook itself, check that:

• the files exist in the expected folder
• the file headers look correct
• symbol names match what the workbook expects
• currencies in the workbook also exist in the external files where needed
• schema.ini is present

Related Pages

• Required data overview
• Scripts overview
• Configure psConfig.txt
• Run UpdatePSData.bat