Business Intelligence Architect, Analysis Services Maestro, and author Bill Pearson kicks off a series to introduce the DAX financial functions. In this article, he exposes five functions that are popular in the calculation of loans and other annuities. Those accustomed to these functions within Excel will find the syntax, uses and operation of the functions familiar within the Power BI environment.… Read more
Azure Data Factory is a cloud based data orchestration tool that many ETL developers began using instead of SSIS. In this article, Rodney Landrum recalls a Data Factory project where he had to depend on another service, Azure Logic Apps, to fill in for some lacking functionality.… Read more
The standard data warehouse design from Kimball with facts and dimensions has been around for almost 25 years. In this article, Vince Iacoboni describes another way to design slowly changing dimensions.… Read more
In the third article of this series, Sanil Mhatre demonstrates how to perform a sentiment analysis using R including generating a word cloud, word associations, sentiment scores, and emotion classification. … Read more
For any Business Intelligence solution to be useful for analytical and decision-making purposes, it is imperative that the underlying data quality is good so, that reports generated are reliable to make business decisions. This article from Imran Quadri Syed walks the through steps involved to implement a successful Data Quality Monitoring framework that would validate incoming data against predefined data quality rules and capture data quality metrics.… Read more
Power BI is perfect for analyzing surveys. In this article, Sanil Mhatre demonstrates how to build several visualizations for key phrases sentiment analysis. … Read more
DAX contains a host of time-intelligence functions with exotic names such as SAMEPERIODLASTYEAR and PARALLELPERIOD. In the last article in this series, Andy Brown explains how to write measures using the range of date functions in DAX, and also explains how time-intelligence functions work behind the scenes. … Read more
Microsoft provides a service to analyze text data called Text Analytics Cognitive Service. In this article, Sanil Mhatre demonstrates how to use this service from Power BI. … Read more
You can use a host of time-intelligence functions in DAX to calculate everything from simple year-to-date totals to moving averages and average opening and closing balances. In this article, Andy Brown shows how to model various scenarios with calendars and dates, and how to get around some of the issues you may encounter. … Read more
The other day, a friend asked me if Microsoft is discontinuing SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) now that Power BI is the premier MS reporting and dashboarding tool. It seems like more organizations are finding fewer reasons to use SSRS due to the ease of use and features of Power BI. Despite all the news … Read more
Most SSRS reports are organized into grouping levels where it’s possible to add totals for each group. In this article, Kathi Kellenberger continues her SSRS series by walking through how to create both a Matrix and Table report. … Read more
Machine learning is a skill that many data professionals are learning as they plan their careers over the next five to ten years. In this article, Supriya Pande gives an overview of machine learning and walks through a practical example.… Read more
Kathi Kellenberger continues her series on SSRS. In this article you learn how to use parameters that let your report users control how the reports are filtered.… Read more
So far in this series, Andy Brown of Wise Owl Training has shed light on functions like CALCULATE, VALUES and FILTER, but it’s only when you understand the idiosyncrasies of the EARLIER function that you can claim to have genuinely cracked DAX. This article gives four examples of the use of this peculiar function, in the process explaining why it has such a misleading name. Using the EARLIER function properly all boils down (as is so often the case with DAX) to understanding row and filter context. The article also shows how to use the RANKX function to sort data into your required order.… Read more
PolyBase has been around since 2016, but Microsoft is enhancing it in 2019 with the ability to connect to more data sources. You can now use PolyBase to connect to other SQL Server instances, and it’s easy to set up with a wizard. In this article Benjamin Weissman explains what’s new in PolyBase and walks you through setting it up and connecting to an external table.… Read more
Microsoft continues to enhance the performance of SQL Server with new features. In this article, Monica Rathbun explains how to work with columnstore indexes, a different way to store tables that can drastically improve the performance of specific workloads.… Read more
Data sources and datasets are critical components of an SSRS report, but many people new to SSRS struggle to understand them. In this article, Kathi Kellenberger shows you how to create these components and explains when they should be shared vs. embedded. … Read more
In this article, Kathi Kellenberger demonstrates how to create a project and report using the SSRS Report Wizard. The wizard is fine for getting started, but you’ll soon learn about its many limitations. She also explains how reports fit in projects and solutions.… Read more
Power BI is an excellent tool for departments or small organisations getting started with their BI solution. Unless some time is spent organising the solution, however, it can become cluttered. In this article, Gogula Aryalingam explains how to streamline the solution to keep it organized and efficient. … Read more
Gogula Aryalingam continues telling the story of the BI solution created by a business analyst intern. In this article, after the initial success, plans are made to sustain and grow the project.… Read more
