Powerbi Custom Visuals

What it does

When your agent uses it

• Mentions custom visual
• Develop a Power BI visual
• Powerbi-visuals-tools
• Capabilities.json

Example prompts

• “custom visual”
• “pbiviz”
• “develop a Power BI visual”
• “/powerbi-custom-visuals”

Requirements

• Node.js

Workflow steps

6 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

1. 1Scaffold: pbiviz new creates the project (src/visual.ts,
2. 2Implement the visual class in src/visual.ts. Implement the IVisual interface;
3. 3Declare data and formatting in capabilities.json: dataRoles (the field wells),
4. 4Build the formatting model with powerbi-visuals-utils-formattingmodel
5. 5Live-preview: pbiviz start, then add the developer visual to a report and iterate
6. 6Package: pbiviz package produces the .pbiviz under dist/; import it into a report

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit a301717. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

• Tool permissions

  Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

  From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

• Runs code

  Shell commands in SKILL.md call:

  • npx
  • npm

  From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

• Network

  No URLs in SKILL.md. Its commands use npx and npm, which can reach the network depending on how they are called.

  From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

• Credentials

  Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

  From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Powerbi Custom Visuals loads about 1.5k tokens when it runs, and up to ~4.2k if it reads all its reference files. Until then it costs about 112 tokens; SKILL.md has 499 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it

~112

When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches

~1.5k

With references · SKILL.md plus every file in references/, read only if the agent opens them

~4.2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from data-goblin/power-bi-agentic-development at commit a301717, republished under its GPL-3.0 licence (© data-goblin). 499 words, ~1,476 tokens.

name

powerbi-custom-visuals

description

Power BI custom visual (.pbiviz) development with the pbiviz toolchain and its MCP server. Automatically invoke when the user mentions "custom visual", "pbiviz", "develop a Power BI visual", "powerbi-visuals-tools", "IVisual", "capabilities.json", "visual formatting model", "visual certification", "publish a visual to AppSource", or asks to scaffold, build, debug, package, certify, or publish a .pbiviz developer visual.

deneb-visuals:    no-code Vega / Vega-Lite specs inside a report; no packaging, no TypeScript
python-visuals:   matplotlib / seaborn script visuals (static image, computes at render)
r-visuals:        ggplot2 script visuals (static image); R's stats ecosystem
svg-visuals:      SVG drawn by a DAX measure (ImageUrl); inline in tables/cards, no visual sandbox
powerbi-custom-visuals (this skill): a real .pbiviz developer visual, reusable across
                  reports and shareable on AppSource; full interactivity, formatting pane, certification

get_available_apis:    look up data, formatting, interaction, and utility APIs with examples
get_best_practices:    API-version management, performance, security, accessibility, testing
add_feature:           list features available to add (bookmarks, tooltips, drill-down, selection, localization)
implement_feature:     step-by-step instructions, code templates, and config changes for a feature
list_visual_info:      extract a project's GUID, version, author, data roles, dependencies
check_vulnerabilities: scan dependencies and source for risky patterns (eval, innerHTML)
prepare_certification: verify required files, configuration, capabilities, and assets pre-submission

© data-goblin, GPL-3.0. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

SKILL.md and 6 other files (references) in plugins/custom-visuals/skills/powerbi-custom-visuals of data-goblin/power-bi-agentic-development.

• SKILL.md
• examples/capabilities-objects.json
• examples/vscode-mcp.json
• references/certification-publishing.md
• references/community-examples.md
• references/mcp-server.md
• references/pbiviz-toolchain.md

Open the folder on GitHubat commit a301717