Power BI Weekly

Issue #79 - 6th October 2020

Hopefully you've had the chance to digest all of the Ignite announcements. Unsurprisingly, it seems the Power BI teams has taken a break from throwing big news our way, so no new announcements for you this week. However, one (seemingly) small update I'm particularly excited by is the introduction of a Dataflow refresh history API endpoint, which Matthew Roche has alluded to in the consequential article Automatically refresh dataset when dataflow refresh completes. If anyone, perchance, has used my alternative method to retrieve a Dataflow's refresh history, stop using that at once! I won't be offended. Probably.

If you haven't had the chance to check out the new Smart Narrative visual yet, then make sure you watch the video from the GuyInACube folks, where Justyna Lucznik has shown just how INSANE AMAZING the visual is. Finally, if you search the internet for queries to generate Date Tables, you'll find hundreds. However, Marco Russo has now described how to create a simpler and chart-friendly Date table in Power BI, which you may like to experiment with.

🛠️ Data Prep

Chris Webb (@cwebb_bi) covers Exporting Data From Websites For Use In Power BI Using Power Automate UI Flows and writes that View Native Query Now Works For Analysis Services Data Sources
Soheil Bakhshi (@biinsightnz) shares Quick Tips: OData Feed Analyser Custom Function in Power Query
Ruth Pozuelo Martinez (@CurbalEN) highlights 2 things you should always do in Power Query
Matthew Roche (@SQLAllFather) describes Impact Analysis in Power BI (Lazy Tutorial)
Microsoft Power BI demo Power BI: Dataflows now support DirectQuery capabilities
On the Towards Data Science blog, Nikola Ilic (@DataMozart) writes Go, getem, Sherlock Doing Data Profiling in Power BI like a PRO
On LaDataWeb, Ignacio Barrau (@ignacho_07) writes Buena práctica para un web request [Spanish]
Also on the Towards Data Science blog, Peter Hui blogs about Dates in Power BI
Belinda Allen (@MsBelindaAllen) talks about Creating a Custom Table in the Microsoft Power BI Query Editor, describes More SEC Football data modeling in Microsoft Power BI Query Editor and discusses Importing data from a CSV Download into Microsoft Power BI

🧩 Data Modeling

On the SQLBI blog, Marco Russo (@marcorus) describes Creating a simpler and chart-friendly Date table in Power BI
Gilbert Quevauvilliers (@GilbertQue) blogs about Using DAX to calculate Cumulative Target amount split into individual months
Ruth Pozuelo Martinez (@CurbalEN) covers DAX Fridays #186: CALCULATE vs CALCULATETABLE
On the Enterprise DNA blog, Sam McKay (@_EnterpriseDNA) shares a number of posts: How To Use A Measure Table In Power BI, Evaluation Context In DAX Calculations, Understanding Power BI Aggregations, How To Use An Iterating Function In Power BI, DAX Calculations Using Table Functions and Advanced DAX Concepts To Master In Power BI - Enterprise DNA Webinar Series
Brian Julius describes How To Install Practice Dataset Power BI Tool
On the Forsight BI blog, Ahmed Oyelowo (@AhmedOyelowo) provides an Intro to Measures
On the Business Intelligist blog, Business Intelligist (@bizintelligist) describes How to Build a Multi-KPI Comparator Using Calculation Groups (Power BI DAX Tutorial)
Matthew Peterson (@mattpetersonbi) describes Avoiding Unwanted Outcomes using Date Columns
On the CSG Pro blog, Rachel Dyer (@rachelrdyer) writes DAX Diaries: Thinking in Tables
Daniil Maslyuk (@DMaslyuk) covers Working with comma-separated values (CSV) in DAX
On the Tessellation Tech blog, Spencer Baucke (@JSBaucke) blogs about Custom Sorting in Power BI

📊 Report Authoring and Interactivity

Adam Saxton and Patrick Leblanc (@GuyInACube) describe that The Power BI Smart Narrative visual is INSANE AMAZING! with Justyna Lucznik
Also on the Power BI community blog, Pragati writes about Conditional Formatting Using Custom Measure
Matt Allington (@ExceleratorBI) describes Waterfall Charts Using Measures in Power BI
On the Power BI community blog, Farhan Ahmed (@FarhanAhmed1984) describes a Bar Chart with Total in Last
Mike Allen (@MikeAinOz) writes about Adaptive Cards for Power BI
On the Power BI Tips and Tricks blog, Mike Carlo and Seth Bauer (@PowerBITips) talk about Designing a Great Power BI Report
Parker Stevens (@PowerBIElite) explains How to Create a Single Value Slider in Power BI
Reid Havens (@HavensBI) discusses Adding Button Animations & Hover Effects in Power BI
Brian Grant (@BrianGrantBI) describes Easy Hex Code Wrangling for Power BI
Jarret Moore describes Using Bookmarks To Change Views On The Report Page In Power BI

🚀 Deployment, Security and Operations

Marc Lelijveld (@MarcLelijveld) explains how to Analyze active sessions and cancel refreshes in Power BI and describes how to Leverage Power BI Deployment Pipelines with Premium per user licensing
Ruth Pozuelo Martinez (@CurbalEN) describes What is Power BI Premium Per User license?
Erik Svensen (@donsvensen) describes how to Setup data driven report subscriptions for Power BI paginated reports with Power Automate
On the SQLBI blog, Marco Russo (@marcorus) walks through Creating a service principal account for Power BI API
On the Tessellation Tech blog, Spencer Baucke (@JSBaucke) describes Optimizing Power BI Reports
,, Matthew Roche (@SQLAllFather) describes how to Automatically refresh dataset when dataflow refresh completes

🌐 General

Adam Saxton (@GuyInACube) shares the Power BI announcements from Microsoft Ignite (Roundup | Sept 28, 2020)
Dhruvin Shah (@DhruvinShah16) covers the Microsoft Ignite 2020 - Power BI Announcements
On the Power BI Tips and Tricks blog, Mike Carlo (@PowerBITips) hosts MVPs React September 2020
Alexander Arvidsson (@arcticdba) shares Podcast episode 134
Brent Allen (@MacrordinaryCA) discusses DA-100 – The Certified Data Analyst Exam
Matthew Roche (@SQLAllFather) talks about Data Culture: All BI apps are NOT created equal
Adam Saxton (@GuyInACube) shares 🔴 Power BI tips from the Pros – LIVE (Oct 3, 2020) (Member Chat 2nd Half)
On the Power BI Tips and Tricks blog, Seth Bauer (@Seth_C_Bauer) highlights the Milwaukee Brew City PUG – Sept 2020