Power BI Weekly

Issue #120 - 27th July 2021

We were hit with both the Power BI July 2021 Feature Summary and the 2021 release wave 2 notes in the last few days. The highlight from the feature summary is arguably the new conditional formatting functionality, which now offers loads more properties to which you can apply rules. As for the release notes, my highlights are the upcoming functionality to provide Artifact-level access for Power BI apps (preview later this year), Natural language to DAX generation (preview early next year) and (for you admins out there), Chargeback reporting for Power BI Premium administrators (in preview early next year).

Another long-awaited feature has landed this week, which is that the Connected PivotTable refresh in Excel for the web is now 100% available to Office tenants, allowing you to interact with Power BI dataset connected Excel PivotTables in Excel online as well as in Desktop. So no more only-cached reports! Also, the Visualizing SharePoint lists feature is now available to all users after a targeted release.

Elsewhere, Yitzhak Kesselman has written an interesting article peeking Behind the scenes: Running the Power BI service, and Reid Havens has dived deep into the Semantics of DAX Queries & Caveats to Composite Models with Jeffrey Wang.

🛠️ Data Prep

Ben Gribaudo (@bgribaudo) writes about Equals Is Not Always Equivalent: When Query Folding Does Not Produce Identical Results
On the Power BI community blog, Greg Deckler (@GregDeckler) writes about The New Copy Query Behavior
On the RADACAD YouTube channel, Reza Rad (@Rad_Reza) describes Age Banding in Power BI using Power Query Merge Queries Based on Between and writes about Fuzzy Grouping in Power BI using Power Query
Hima Bindu Marri (@sivahimabindu) writes about Fuzzy match in Power BI Power BI for beginners
Maya Raviv describes how to Automatically remove empty columns and rows from a table in Power BI
Melissa de Korte (@_EnterpriseDNA) describes How To Create New Records Based On Date Fields

🧩 Data Modeling

On the SQLBI blog, Alberto Ferrari (@FerrariAlberto) describes Customizing default values for each user in Power BI reports, and shares a couple of tutorials: TREATAS – DAX Guide and IGNORE – DAX Guide
Also on the SQLBI blog, Marco Russo (@marcorus) explains segment size in Power BI Premium – Unplugged #29
Reid Havens (@HavensBI) discusses the Semantics of DAX Queries & Caveats to Composite Models with Jeffrey Wang
On the Enterprise DNA blog, Nick Mone shares a few blogs: DAX Query Optimization Techniques And Lessons, DAX Queries Using Variables And Important Functions, Iterators and Context Transitions In DAX Queries and Optimizing Queries For A Faster DAX Performance
Chris Webb (@cwebb_bi) writes about the Query Pending Event In Power BI Performance Analyzer
Mimoune Djouallah (@mim_djo) discusses Building a Metrics Store using Power BI
Avi Singh (@powerbipro) writes Power BI Relationships Not Working? Four Steps to Debug 🐞

📊 Report Authoring and Interactivity

On the Power BI blog, Jeroen ter Heerdt (@jeroenterheerdt) shares the Power BI July 2021 Feature Summary
Also on the Power BI blog, Amanda Rivera (@MissAmandaN) highlights that Visualizing SharePoint lists now available to all users
On the Power BI community blog, Amit Chandak (@amitchandak78) writes about Ways to Install Power BI Desktop with Pros and Cons
Maya Raviv shares the New Version: Custom Visuals Exploration Tool
On the Enterprise DNA blog, Mudassir Ali covers Dumbbell Charts: Custom Visual Vs. Charticulator and discusses Bullet Charts: Advanced Custom Visuals for Power BI
Fowmy Abdulmuttalib (@ExcelFort) describes How to create an In-Page Navigation with Bookmarks and Buttons in Power BI
Patrick Leblanc (@GuyInACube) provides an Intro to R with Power BI
Bas Dohmen (@HowToPowerBI) writes about a Conditional Drill Button in Power BI
Reid Havens (@HavensBI) blogs about Integrating Time Intelligence Filters with Drillthrough in Power BI
On the Burningsuit blog, Alison Box shares Charticulator in Power BI #12 – Horizontal Line & Vertical Line Scaffolds

🚀 Deployment, Security and Operations

Marc Lelijveld (@MarcLelijveld) explains how to Transform a local into a global Power BI solution – Content sharing
Paul Turley (@paul_turley) provides A Developer's Guide to Creating Bad Power BI Projects – Part 1
On the CSG Pro blog, Rachel Dyer (@rachelrdyer) tells us to Build Your Enterprise Power BI Deployment Team This Way
Gilbert Quevauvilliers (@GilbertQue) blogs about Logging Datasets, users & query performance – Part 6 – Migration AAS to PPU
Brett Powell (@BrettPowell76) discusses Power BI Fraud
Bas Dohmen (@HowToPowerBI) talks about Row Level Security in Power BI

🌐 General

On the Power BI blog, Ikechukwu Edeagu explains that Connected PivotTable refresh in Excel for the web is now 100% available to Office tenants
On the Prologika blog, Teo Lachev (@tlachev) writes about Interactive Excel Pivots in Power BI
Also on the Power BI blog, Yitzhak Kesselman writes Behind the scenes: Running the Power BI service
Also on the Power BI blog, Kelly Kaye (@MS_KellyKaye) shares Join us! Power BI Dev Camp – Thursday 22 July, 2021- Building Multi-language Reports for Power BI
Adam Saxton (@GuyInACube) talks about Looking into the future of Power BI 2021
The Power BI team (@MSPowerBI) shares the Overview of Power BI 2021 release wave 2
The Knee-Deep in Tech team (@KneeDeepinTech) shares Podcast episode 157
Adam Saxton and Patrick Leblanc (@GuyInACube) share Power BI tips from the Pros – LIVE (July 24, 2021)
Matt Allington (@ExceleratorBI) walks through Building A Power BI COVID Report From Scratch and writes about the Case Fatality Rate for COVID in Australia
Allison Kennedy blogs about Tokyo Olympics: Power Query Custom Functions, Tokyo Olympics: Cross Filter Direction and DAX Measures and Tokyo Olympics: Schedule Refresh in PowerBI.com