Table Of ContentTHE EXPERT’S VOICE® IN BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE
Pro Power BI
Desktop
Free interactive data analysis with
Microsoft Power BI
—
Adam Aspin
www.it-ebooks.info
Pro Power BI Desktop
Adam Aspin
www.it-ebooks.info
Pro Power BI Desktop
Adam Aspin
Stoke-on-Trent
Staffordshire, United Kingdom
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4842-1804-4 ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4842-1805-1
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4842-1805-1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016938680
Copyright © 2016 by Adam Aspin
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is
concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction
on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic
adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. Exempted
from this legal reservation are brief excerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis or material supplied
specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser
of the work. Duplication of this publication or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the Copyright
Law of the Publisher's location, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer.
Permissions for use may be obtained through RightsLink at the Copyright Clearance Center. Violations are liable to
prosecution under the respective Copyright Law.
Trademarked names, logos, and images may appear in this book. Rather than use a trademark symbol with every
occurrence of a trademarked name, logo, or image we use the names, logos, and images only in an editorial fashion
and to the benefit of the trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the trademark.
The use in this publication of trade names, trademarks, service marks, and similar terms, even if they are not identified
as such, is not to be taken as an expression of opinion as to whether or not they are subject to proprietary rights.
While the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication, neither
the authors nor the editors nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any errors or omissions that may
be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein.
Managing Director: Welmoed Spahr
Lead Editor: Jonathan Gennick
Development Editor: Douglas Pundick
Technical Reviewer: Ian Rice
Editorial Board: Steve Anglin, Pramila Balen, Louise Corrigan, Jim DeWolf, Jonathan Gennick,
Robert Hutchinson, Celestin Suresh John, Michelle Lowman, James Markham, Susan McDermott,
Matthew Moodie, Jeffrey Pepper, Douglas Pundick, Ben Renow-Clarke, Gwenan Spearing
Coordinating Editor: Jill Balzano
Copy Editor: Kim Burton-Weisman
Compositor: SPi Global
Indexer: SPi Global
Artist: SPi Global
Distributed to the book trade worldwide by Springer Science+Business Media New York, 233 Spring Street,
6th Floor, New York, NY 10013. Phone 1-800-SPRINGER, fax (201) 348-4505, e-mail [email protected] ,
or visit w ww.springer.com . Apress Media, LLC is a California LLC and the sole member (owner) is Springer
Science + Business Media Finance Inc (SSBM Finance Inc). SSBM Finance Inc is a Delaware corporation.
For information on translations, please e-mail [email protected] , or visit w ww.apress.com .
Apress and friends of ED books may be purchased in bulk for academic, corporate, or promotional use.
eBook versions and licenses are also available for most titles. For more information, reference our Special Bulk
Sales–eBook Licensing web page at w ww.apress.com/bulk-sales .
Any source code or other supplementary material referenced by the author in this text is available to readers at
www.apress.com . For detailed information about how to locate your book’s source code, go to
www.apress.com/source-code/ .
Printed on acid-free paper
www.it-ebooks.info
To the memories of my mother and grandmother
www.it-ebooks.info
www.it-ebooks.info
Contents at a Glance
About the Author ..................................................................................................xxiii
About the Technical Reviewer ...............................................................................xxv
Acknowledgments ...............................................................................................xxvii
Introduction ..........................................................................................................xxix
■ Chapter 1: Introduction to Power BI Desktop ........................................................1
■ Chapter 2: Discovering and Loading Data with Power BI Desktop ......................35
■ Chapter 3: Transforming Datasets .......................................................................79
■ Chapter 4: Data Cleansing .................................................................................109
■ Chapter 5: Data Mashup ....................................................................................131
■ Chapter 6: Creating a Data Model ......................................................................175
■ Chapter 7: Extending the Data Model with Calculated Columns .......................205
■ Chapter 8: Adding Measures to the Data Model ................................................239
■ Chapter 9: Analyzing Data over Time ................................................................267
■ Chapter 10: Text-Based Visualizations ..............................................................301
■ Chapter 11: Charts in Power BI Desktop ...........................................................333
■ Chapter 12: Other Types of Visuals ....................................................................371
■ Chapter 13: Filtering Data .................................................................................401
v
www.it-ebooks.info
■ CONTENTS AT A GLANCE
■ Chapter 14: Using Slicers ..................................................................................429
■ Chapter 15: Enhancing Dashboards ..................................................................451
■ Chapter 16: PowerBI.com ..................................................................................471
■ Appendix A: Sample Data ..................................................................................501
Index .....................................................................................................................503
vi
www.it-ebooks.info
Contents
About the Author ..................................................................................................xxiii
About the Technical Reviewer ...............................................................................xxv
Acknowledgments ...............................................................................................xxvii
Introduction ..........................................................................................................xxix
■ Chapter 1: Introduction to Power BI Desktop ........................................................1
The Microsoft Self-Service Business Intelligence Solution ..............................................2
Import Data from Diverse Sources .........................................................................................................2
Model Your Data ......................................................................................................................................3
Creating Dashboards and Reports ..........................................................................................................3
Power BI Desktop Files ...........................................................................................................................3
Installing Power BI Desktop .............................................................................................4
Removing Power BI Desktop ..................................................................................................................9
Running Power BI Desktop ...................................................................................................................10
A First Power BI Desktop Dashboard..............................................................................10
Loading the Source Data ......................................................................................................................11
The Data Load Process ...................................................................................................14
The Navigator Window ..........................................................................................................................15
The Navigator Data Preview .................................................................................................................15
Modifying Data .....................................................................................................................................16
The Power BI Desktop Window ......................................................................................16
Your First Visualizations .................................................................................................17
Display Available Fields ........................................................................................................................18
Add a Matrix of Sales per Country by Year ...........................................................................................19
vii
www.it-ebooks.info
■ CONTENTS
Add a Column Chart of Delivery Charge by Model ................................................................................21
Add a Map of Labor Cost by Country ....................................................................................................23
Add a Card Showing the Total Cost of Spare Parts ...............................................................................24
Add a Slicer by Make ............................................................................................................................25
Arranging the Dashboard ......................................................................................................................26
Interactivity in Dashboards .............................................................................................28
Creating and Modifying Reports .....................................................................................29
Adding Pages ........................................................................................................................................30
Renaming Pages ...................................................................................................................................30
Deleting Pages ......................................................................................................................................30
Moving Pages .......................................................................................................................................31
Duplicating Pages .................................................................................................................................31
Scrolling through Collections of Pages .................................................................................................31
Importing Excel and Power View Items ..........................................................................31
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................34
■ Chapter 2: Discovering and Loading Data with Power BI Desktop ......................35
Data Sources ..................................................................................................................36
File Sources ..........................................................................................................................................37
Databases .............................................................................................................................................37
Azure ....................................................................................................................................................38
Other Sources .......................................................................................................................................39
Loading Data ..................................................................................................................40
Web Pages ............................................................................................................................................40
CSV Files ...............................................................................................................................................44
Text Files ...............................................................................................................................................47
XML Files ..............................................................................................................................................49
Excel .....................................................................................................................................................51
Microsoft Access Databases .................................................................................................................52
Relational Databases: SQL Server ..................................................................................53
Automatically Loading Related Tables ..................................................................................................55
Database Options .................................................................................................................................56
viii
www.it-ebooks.info
■ CONTENTS
Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services Data Sources ..................................................63
Analysis Services Cube Tools ...............................................................................................................66
Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services Tabular Data Sources ......................................68
Other Data Sources ........................................................................................................71
Reusing Recent Data Sources ........................................................................................71
Reusing a Data Source .........................................................................................................................71
Pinning a Data Source ..........................................................................................................................73
Refreshing Data ..............................................................................................................74
Refreshing a Query ...............................................................................................................................74
Refreshing All the Queries in a Power BI Desktop File .........................................................................74
Old Data ................................................................................................................................................74
Connection Security .......................................................................................................75
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................77
■ Chapter 3: Transforming Datasets .......................................................................79
Power BI Desktop Queries ..............................................................................................80
Editing Data After a Data Load ..............................................................................................................80
Transforming Data Before Loading .......................................................................................................82
Query or Load? ...............................................................................................................82
The Power BI Desktop Query Editor ...............................................................................83
The Applied Steps List ..........................................................................................................................84
The Power BI Desktop Query Editor Ribbons ........................................................................................85
Dataset Shaping .............................................................................................................91
Renaming Columns...............................................................................................................................91
Reordering Columns .............................................................................................................................92
Removing Columns ...............................................................................................................................93
Merging Columns .................................................................................................................................93
Removing Records ................................................................................................................................96
Removing Duplicate Records ................................................................................................................99
Sorting Data ........................................................................................................................................100
Reversing the Row Order ....................................................................................................................101
ix
www.it-ebooks.info
