Power BI coupled with Power Automate allows for super-fast dataset refreshes
I found that using Power Automate to refresh Power BI Datasets allowed for refreshes to happen at the exact time I needed them to. This was because my underlying data warehouse load would vary, by using Power Automate it allowed me to have the Power BI Dataset refresh to happen as soon as my data was ready. By using Power…
Create Currency Formatting Strings using Calculation Groups in Power BI Pro & Premium / Azure Analysis Services / SQL Server Analysis Services 2019
Below are the steps on how I got the calculation groups to work for Currency formatting strings when the currency format string will be displayed per currency shown. Following on from my previous blog post (How to create and use Calculation Groups in Power BI Pro & Premium / Azure Analysis Services / SQL Server Analysis Services 2019) on how…
How to create and use Calculation Groups in Power BI Pro & Premium / Azure Analysis Services / SQL Server Analysis Services 2019
I have been reading some great blog posts from SQLBI.COM on using and implementing Calculation Groups. What I did find is that currently there is not step by step process on how to get this working. This is what I will do in my blog post below. As it stands today 29 April 2020 you can currently use calculation groups…
How to refresh selected (not all) tables in Power BI Desktop
When working with Power BI datasets I often want to refresh multiple tables, BUT not all the tables in my model. (This often happens when I made a change to underlying data sources and I want to make sure it is working as expected in Power BI Desktop) I recently found that I could do it by doing the following…
Create Trello Reporting using Power BI
Where I am consulting, they use Trello boards which enables them to keep track of what tasks are being done, getting done and how things are progressing. An interesting question came up asking how much work has been done. And I thought this could be done via Trello and looking at the number of tasks in the boards that have…
Creating a Power BI Report from the Audit Logs stored in Azure Blob Storage
Following on from my blog post on How you can store All your Power BI Audit Logs easily and indefinitely in Azure, I wanted to share with you how I connected to the Blob Storage Files and created my Power BI report, to report on the audit logs. Pre-requisites Before starting with the Power BI report, I first had to…
Power BI – Which Groups can be used to set Permissions in Power BI
There are quite a few areas where Power BI can assign permissions. Below is a list of which permissions can be assigned by which Groups that are available in Power BI. Explanation of Groups Security Group This is also known as an Active Directory Security Group. This group lives within Active Directory and Azure Active Directory. It is where you…
How to configure Incremental Refreshing in Power BI with DateKey or Date (instead of the default DateTime)
I was helping on the Power BI community forum (where I certainly learn a lot) and I came across this blog post where a Microsoft Employee had suggested that a Power Query function could be used as part of the Incremental refresh. What I mean by this is when implementing Incremental refreshing in Power BI the default is that you…
A Real implementation of Approximate Distinct Count vs DISTINCTCOUNT is 7X faster!
I am very fortunate to have known Phil Seamark for quite some time. And quite a while ago we were chatting, and Phil mentioned that he had this idea that he could get an approximate distinct count working where it could be VERY close to the actual DISTINCTCOUNT (Using DAX) If you are unaware one of the most expensive DAX…
Ensuring your Power BI Incremental Refresh does not Timeout when using a SQL Server Source
I recently was updating my PBIX files to use the Incremental refresh. I ran into a timeout error as shown below. This was because on the first refresh it has to process all the data before it can incrementally refresh the dataset. As per the documentation the default timeout for a SQL Server database is set to 10 minutes, and…