By Scott Bryson, Business Intelligence Developer, CSL
Power BI Update
A game changing new feature in the Power BI May update.
This month we’re mainly focusing in on a huge new update from Microsoft, Field Parameters.
As with previous updates, some new features are in preview, meaning that you will need to ensure you’ve selected ‘Preview Features’ in the Options & Settings menu pane.
Here are the highlights
Reporting
Field Parameters (Preview)
Field Parameters is a new feature that has been launched by Microsoft for May and is arguably the biggest change for developers for a long time.
It is fully explained in Microsoft’s update (link at the end of this post) but in essence it allows users to dynamically change the measures or dimensions being analysed within a report.
This means end-users can explore and customise the analysis of the report by selecting the different measures or dimensions they are interested in.
We have included below a simple video showing this in action, with some real-world scenarios where this would be useful.
It has been possible to change measures or dimensions being analysed in reports for some time in Power BI. However, previously, it was far more complex and required significantly more development time to achieve this level of customised analysis.
With this new feature it allows solutions to be developed much more easily and quickly. Maybe your requirements revolve around wanting to view your sales figures in five different dimensions. This is now much more straightforward to develop, which will lead to quicker solution launches.
This will massively help end users too, giving them more ways to dive into their data. A really exciting new feature from Microsoft!
Canvas Zoom
Being able to zoom into reports feels like it should have been a key feature from the start, but after being long anticipated it has finally arrived.
This will allow clients to zoom into their charts and tables that are presented. This sounds like such a simple improvement, but I expect it to make a big difference!
Data Connectivity and preparation
This month’s new and updated connectors listed below
Service
Visualisations
To Wrap It Up
That wraps up our summary of the main interesting new features delivered with this update. You can find the full summary here.
For support in getting the most out of Power BI, please call us on 01483 528302 or email info@csl-uk.com, or read more about how our Power BI experts can support you here.
