Blog – Page 22 – Prologika

Atlanta MS BI and Power BI Group Meeting on May 4th

April 27, 2020 / No Comments »

MS BI fans, please join us online for the next Atlanta MS BI and Power BI Group meeting on Monday, May 4th, at 6:30 PM. Bill Anton will show you how to effectively apply time intelligence to your Power BI data models. For more details, visit our group page and don't forget to RSVP (fill in the RSVP survey if you're planning to attend). Presentation: Power BI Time Intelligence – Beyond the Basics Date: May 4th, 2020 Time 6:30 – 8:30 PM ET Place: Join Microsoft Teams Meeting Learn more about Teams | Meeting options Computer audio is recommended Conference bridge number 1 605 475 4300, Access Code: 208547 Overview: Time-Intelligence refers to analyzing calculations and metrics across time and is the most common type of business intelligence reporting. Power BI has a lot of built in capabilities to help you get started but these alone are not always enough for most...
Sentiment Analysis with Power BI

April 22, 2020 / No Comments »

A recent ask from an airline company was to perform sentiment analysis on comments in surveys collected from their customers. Sentiment analysis is a machine learning task that requires natural language processing. In Power BI, we have at least two ways to approach this requirement: Cognitive Services and custom code, such as by using the Python Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK). This post compares the pros and cons of each option based on my impressions so far. Cognitive Services Python Licensing Included in premium or embedded capacity or, provisioned separately with Azure subscription with Power BI Pro Freely available Provisioning Already provisioned with premium or embedded (need to enable AI workloads) Install Python Install pandas, matplotlib, and nltk packages Language detection Yes No Data refresh No gateway required Personal gateway required Enhanced dataset metadata Supported Not supported Cognitive Services Cognitive Services is an Azure PaaS cloud service that supports text analytics...
Virtual Power BI Dashboard in a Day (DIAD) on April 30

April 18, 2020 / No Comments »

Register for my next online Power BI Dashboard in a Day (DIAD) workshop and hone your data analytics skills! Drive value for your organization and on the road to recovery after COVID-19. Attend from anywhere for only $199. I'll teach you practical Power BI knowledge and data analytics skills that you can immediately apply to your job. See how Power BI can improve your usability and productivity even further. Date: April 30, 2020 Time: 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM Eastern Time (GMT -4) Price: $199 For more information and to register, go to https://prologika.com/event/diad20200430/
Power BI Source Control

April 12, 2020 / No Comments »

Question: How to put Power BI files under source control? Workaround: Power BI Desktop does not currently support source control and it doesn't have an Excel-like extensibility mechanism to let developers take from where Microsoft left off. However, thanks to the enhanced dataset metadata (currently in preview), you can implement a rudimentary source control policy while waiting for third parties to fill in the void by using these steps: In Power BI Desktop, go to File, Options and settings, Options. In the "Preview features" tab, check "Store datasets using enhanced metadata format" if this feature is still in preview. Restart Power BI Desktop when asked. In Power BI Desktop, go to File, Save As and save the file as a Power BI Template (*.pbit) file. This removes the imported data which you don't need for source control and keeps the file small. If you want to put all artifacts (reports,...
Two Virtual Workshops to Learn the Power BI Platform

April 5, 2020 / No Comments »

Take advantage of this exclusive opportunity to increase your data IQ from the comfort of your home wherever you are! Register today for my instructor-led digital training events and learn the Microsoft Power Platform consisting of Power BI, Power Apps, and Power Automate. 1-Day Power BI Dashboard in a Day (DIAD) Workshop Date: April 14, 2020 Time: 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM Eastern Time (GMT -4) Price: $199 For more information and to register, go to https://prologika.com/event/diad20200414/ 1-Day Application in a Day (AIAD) Workshop Date: April 21, 2020 Time: 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM Eastern Time (GMT -4) Price: $199 For more information and to register, go to https://prologika.com/event/aaid20200421/ The workshops will be conducted online. Login instructions will be sent to registered attendees before the event.
Atlanta MS BI and Power BI Group Meeting on April 6th

April 2, 2020 / No Comments »

MS BI fans, the time has come for a virtual meeting. Please join us online for the next Atlanta MS BI and Power BI Group meeting on Monday, April 6th, at 6:30 PM. I'll show you how business analysts can apply AutoML in Power BI Premium to create predictive models. For more details, visit our group page and don't forget to RSVP (fill in the RSVP survey if you're planning to attend). Presentation: Bringing Predictive Analytics to the Business User with Power BI AutoML (Virtual Meeting) Date: April 6th, 2020 Time 6:30 – 8:30 PM ET Place: Join Microsoft Teams Meeting Learn more about Teams | Meeting options Computer audio is recommended Conference bridge number 1 605 475 4300, Access Code: 208547 Overview: With the growing demand for predictive analytics, Automated Machine Learning (AutoML) aims to simplify this process and democratize Machine Learning so business users can create their own basic predictive...
How Much Are You Really Saving?

March 30, 2020 / No Comments »

I helped an ISV a while back with their BI model design. They purchased a data transformation tool for $5,200/year because it's "simple to use" (the tool was designed for self-service data transformation tasks by business analysists) and "relatively inexpensive". The idea was to run the tool manually every time they have new data, import data from text files, transform, and output the data in another set of files, and then load the transformed data in Power BI. However, as it typically happens, the data transformation complexity quickly outgrew this approach. What did the ISV learn along the way? Stage the data – Although it's tempting to do transformations on the fly, data typically must be staged so you can query and manipulate it. This is also required to compare the input dataset with the target dataset and take care of things like Type 2 slowly changing dimensions that may...
Tracking COVID

March 28, 2020 / No Comments »

I've seen various reports designed to track COVID-19. I personally like the Microsoft Bing tracker (https://www.bing.com/covid). Not only does the report track the current counts, but it also shows a trend over time. It even goes down to a county level (the trend is not available at that level)! And it's very fast. As good as it is, this is one report I hope I don't have to use for long... Stay healthy! Here is another more advanced dashboard that a data geek will appreciate.
Getting to Power Apps Source Code

March 26, 2020 / No Comments »

As it stands, Power Apps doesn't offer an easy way to get to the app source code. Yet, there are scenarios where this could be useful, including: Putting the app source under source control when the Power Apps version history is not enough. Currently, Power Apps doesn't integrate with source code repos, such as GitHub. Finding references to an item. For example, I've referenced a collection in the wrong property, and I couldn't find what triggered the collection load on the app startup. Since Power Apps doesn't currently include dependency analysis for collections, I wanted to search the source code to find all references to it. Here is the fastest way to get to the app source code: Open the app in edit mode and click Save As. Choose "This computer" and click Download to download the app as a *.msapp file Rename the extension of the downloaded file to...
Getting Lineage Across Power BI Tenant

March 22, 2020 / No Comments »

Power BI Service (powerbi.com) packs a graphical lineage view with the caveat that it only works within a workspace. As a Power BI admin, you may need a utility to inventory all Power BI artifacts published to all workspaces (including My Workspaces) in your Power BI tenant. Fortunately, the Admin - Groups GetGroupsAsAdmin can do the job in one call without any coding! Don't be misled by "groups" in the API name as groups are equivalent to workspaces (the original V1 workspaces were joined by the hip with O365 groups so Microsoft got carried away here, which I'm sure they regret by now given than V2 workspaces decoupled from groups :-). Go to the API page and click the "Try it" button (isn't great that you can test any Power BI API without writing a single line of code?). Sign in with your Power BI credentials when prompted. Enter a...