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Power BI – Q1 2024

Maarten François -
PowerBI Q1 2024

Version Updates

Almost every month is being updated. These updates introduce additional features to enhance your ability to integrate or analyze, while also addressing any issues such as bugs or security vulnerabilities. In this blog post, we will summarize the top features of the last 3 months. (Although there was no update in January, so in fact it’s only for 2 months)

Reporting

  1. Visual calculations (In Preview) – Feb and Mar 2024 Update

Visual calculations are DAX calculations that are defined and executed directly within a visual. Any data within the visual, whether it’s columns, measures, or other visual calculations, can be referenced by these calculations. Useful examples where one could use these new calculations would be running sums or moving averages. They simplify calculations that were previously challenging or nearly impossible to accomplish.

In addition to most normal DAX functions (functions that rely on model relationships such as USERELATIONSHIP, RELATED or RELATEDTABLE aren’t available.), we can also use the following (new) functions that only work in visual calculations:

  • COLLAPSE
  • COLLAPSEALL
  • EXPAND
  • EXPANDALL
  • FIRST
  • ISATLEVEL
  • LAST
  • MOVINGAVERAGE
  • NEXT
  • PREVIOUS
  • RANGE
  • RUNNINGSUM

Visual calculations come equipped with templates designed to simplify the process of creating commonly used calculations. To access these templates, simply click on the template button and select the one you wish to use.


More info can be found in the official Power BI article:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/transform-model/desktop-visual-calculations-overview

Note: To use features that are in preview, you need to enable them in Options and Settings ->  Options
->  Preview features. 

Do take into account that you don’t start overusing this new feature, since it does also have it’s downside from regular DAX. eg:

  • Drillthrough is disabled
  • Cannot change the sort order
  • Cannot use field paremeters
  • Cannot use conditional formatting

Only use a visual calculation when regular DAX does not suffice. You should have your metrics centralized and not spread around in multiple dashboard in your visual calculations.

2. Dynamic subscriptions for Power BI reports (In Preview) – Feb 2024 Update

Dynamic per-recipient subscriptions are now in Preview for Power BI reports! Similar to dynamic subscriptions for paginated reports, you can now send a personalized version of a Power BI report to each recipient of an email subscription.

3. On-Object improvements – Feb 2024 and Mar 2024 Update

  • Multi-visual containers now support formatting! Previously, when multiple different visual types were selected, the format pane did not support options in regards to formatting. Now formatting is available (even when it is empty).
  • Bug fixes:
    • Previously, when interacting with a non-visual element such as a text box, button, image, or shape, the build pane would close on its own. Now, the build pane remains open unless explicitly closed, regardless of the selected item type.
    • The style bug that caused the build pane to display 5 icons across instead of the usual 6 has been resolved.
    • In certain instances, the data flyout extended beyond the window size, making it difficult to use the search box. This issue has been resolved.
  • Enhancements:
    • The Gauge visual now supports on-object formatting sub selections.
    • Now, when selecting a field using the data flyout, you can click anywhere on the field name to choose it, rather than just the checkbox next to it.
    • If replacing a field in a visual that does not use an aggregation or date hierarchy (other dropdowns are disabled), we auto open the data dropdown to save an extra click.

4. Mobile Layout auto-create (In Preview) – Mar 2024 Update

You’re now able to auto-create your mobile layout based on the graphs you have created, This way you already have a layout to start working from.

5. Extra enhancements – Feb 2024 and March 2024 Update

A bunch of smaller enhancements were added:

  • Power BI Azure Maps Visual can now also use KML, WKT , Shapefile and URL (link) formats.
  • Power BI Home is now enabled by default in Power BI Desktop. (In Preview)
  • Data bars in matrix subtotal/total conditional formatting
  • Horizontal alignment for data labels is now available

The pane switcher has been renamed to Pane manager and has been updated based on feedback. The order of the pane listings has been altered and the settings that pertain to the Pane manager have been added directly in this menu.

Modelling

  1. Measure descriptions with Copilot. (In Preview)

Enhance your semantic model documentation efficiency by generating measure descriptions using Copilot.

  1. DAX query view improvements. (In Preview)

In the Nov 2023 update there was the release of DAX query view which now is being improved upon.

  • Boolean values are shown in the results grid.
  • A bug causing active query tab to stop being highlighted is fixed.
  • A bug with close brackets of a nested IFs DAX formula is fixed.
  • Additional INFO DAX functions (INFO.CHANGEDPROPERTIES(), INFO.EXCLUDEDARTIFACTS(),INFO.FUNCTIONS(),INFO.LINGUISTICMETADATA())
  • INFO.STORAGETABLECOLUMNS()
  • INFO.STORAGETABLECOLUMNSEGMENTS()
  • INFO.STORAGETABLES()
  • Copilot is now also available.
    • Generate DAX queries from natural language
    • Get explanations of queries and functions or general DAX topics
  • Re-ordering of query tabs is now available.
  1. Enhanced row-level security editor is Enabled by Default (In Preview) – Mar 2024 Update

The enhanced row-level security editor is now available as default for Desktop. With the editor you can quickly define your RLS roles and filters without the use of DAX.

Data Connectivity

SingleStore has neem moved out of beta and you can now cancel queries that are running. Which had difficulties while it was in beta.

Service

1. Storytelling in PowerPoint – Replace report URLs with shareable links in Power BI add-in- Feb 2024 Update

Using a sharable link ensures that other users viewing the presentation have the required permission to see the report, and do not need to request access when viewing the presentation.

2. Updates to Explore – Feb 2024 and March 2024 Update

  • Powered by Copilot, data overview now gives an overview of what’s contained in the data that being explored and tries to highlight interesting things.
  • Now it’s simply to undo your previous action or use the ‘Reset all changes’ to go back to the last save state of your exploration.

Note: If you haven’t saved your exploration yet, then reset will clear your canvas back to blank.

  • The new ‘clear all’ feature allows you to wipe your canvas back to blank. This works great when using Explore as a whiteboarding space, maybe you have a new thought you’d like to explore and want to essentially erase what you have in one click. This is made simple with the new ‘clear all’ option.
  • Filter cards in Explore have been updated to readable and accessible..

3. Updates to data model editing in the Service – Mar 2024 Update

The following improvements have been made to data model editing in the Service:

  • Autodetect relationship in your semantic model
  • Edit the sort by property for a column
  • Updates to the Row Level security editor
    • Utilize IntelliSense to assist in defining your DAX expression.
    • Verify the validity of your DAX expression by clicking the check button.
    • Revert changes to your DAX expression by selecting the X button.

4. Folders in Workspace (In Preview)

Folders are now able to be created in the Workspace to make it easier to organize your project files.

Paginated Reports

You can now connect to new data sources such as Snowflake and Databricks using the “Get Data” button in Power BI Report Builder. (In Preview)

Additionally it is now also possible to translate your report in multiple languages without having to create multiple reports.

Visualizations

The blog posts from Microsoft also contain a section with a bunch of custom visuals, which are definitely worth a look.

Links to the Power BI blog posts:

https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/power-bi-february-2024-feature-summary/

https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/power-bi-march-2024-feature-summary/

Upcoming

  1. Further git integration and improvement of CI/CD in Fabric

On the SQLBits event it was announced that more Fabric items will be supported in git. Most of the listed items are currently in preview.

  1. PBIR

Also at SQLBits a new enhancement to PBIR has been announced. The new PBIR format will person readable/editable format for the report file. This will make it possible to edit any report through a simple text editor and will enable more detailed version control. You could for example set up sizing, rounding of edges, colors for all visual very quickly.

  1. Roadmap

A roadmap was presented on Day 1 of the MS Fabric conference. The version history item looks very interesting. And of course, dark mode is always a plus.

Interesting reads

  1. An interesting article from Nick Jeffries on the exceleratorbi blog goes through an example of dynamic and static row level security.

    https://exceleratorbi.com.au/ways-to-configure-rls-in-power-bi/

  2. BI-Lingual Analytics has a very interesting series of videos where he creates an automated way to manage access with the use of Power Apps and Power Automate.
  1. Havens Consulting shows off a clever way to create dynamic column headers through the usage of field parameters.
  1. The next video goes through an example from workout-wednesday.com where they use HTML and CSS in the Card (New) and Matrix core Power BI visuals.
  1. Lastly, Paul Turley has written a nice blog post on how Power BI fits into Fabric and discusses (at high level) what step to take to move to Fabric:

https://sqlserverbi.blog/2024/03/18/moving-from-power-bi-to-microsoft-fabric/