CI/CD Magic: Unlocking the Power of Microsoft Fabric

Supercharge your CI/CD game with Microsoft Fabric! Get ready to transform your workflows and say goodbye to development headaches. This session dives into the magic of Git integration and deployment pipelines—making teamwork a breeze and efficiency your new best friend.

Explore Git’s Grimoire: branching like a pro, mastering pull requests, and nailing code reviews. It’s all about boosting collaboration, keeping everyone accountable, and ensuring your code evolves with your needs. From development to testing to production, we’ll show you how to make those pipeline transitions feel like a well-choreographed dance.

And, yes, we’re not skipping the quirks—because every spell has its downside. Microsoft Fabric might have a few eccentricities, but with these expert tips and workarounds, you’ll handle them like a champ.

Whether you're a coding mage, a solution architect extraordinaire, or just curious about the latest in CI/CD wizardry, this session will leave you armed with the know-how to future-proof your projects.

Power BI - Performing Data Quality Checks Using Python & SQL

Picture this, you have a report in Power BI that someone passes off to you for data quality checks. Simple enough until they clarify they need every measure checked against the source database.
There are a few ways to make sure the measures match what is in the source data system, but you need something easily repeatable and self documenting. In this presentation, I will walk through how to use python and excel to perform our data quality checks in one batch and document any differences. In order to do that, we are going to build a python script that can run Power BI REST APIs, connect to a SQL Server, and read/write to Excel.
By the end of this session, attendees will have a plug and play tool to check data from SQL against Power BI.

Internet is required

Exploring Real-Time Horizons with Microsoft Fabric

Blast off into the future of analytics with this interstellar session on real-time data processing in Microsoft Fabric!

From setting up KQL databases to capturing data streams from the International Space Station (yes, really!), this session is packed with hands-on tips and tricks. You'll explore how to harness the power of Event Streams and Logic Apps to create a seamless data pipeline that fuels real-time Power BI reports.

Discover the basics of KQL—spoiler alert, it’s not SQL! Learn to query data like a tabular astronaut, watching your dashboards come to life with up-to-the-minute updates. With step-by-step guidance and plenty of cosmic creativity, you'll master real-time analytics faster than a rocket launch.

Whether you're a data explorer, a real-time analytics enthusiast, or just curious about real-time tracking space missions, this session is your ticket to the stars. Prepare for liftoff as we explore how Microsoft Fabric can transform your streaming data into celestial insights.

Power BI - How to Fix an Inherited Report

A common request in the realm of reporting is "hey, we have this report that a previous VIP used, but the report is really slow and the new VIP would like to revamp the report to answer their questions". Great, you think, I can knock this out no problem! Then, you open the report. Fifty tables, over a hundred measures, and six calculated tables later you start to panic.
This session will go into best practices for dissecting a complicated report and a checklist for quick wins. No need to panic, this session will help build a toolbelt to tackle any reconstruction project.

Power BI Meets Programmability – TOM, XMLA, C#, and TMDL

It is rare to find a Power BI developer who has a background in C#, but C# and other programming languages offer a lot of automation and scalability that is lacking in Power BI. XMLA is a powerful tool available in the online Power BI service that allows report developers to connect to their data model and adjust a variety of entities outside the Power BI Desktop application. For example, the XMLA endpoints can be used within a pipeline triggered by an application to update a Power BI model schema. This allows end users to create custom UDFs (user defined fields) on the fly and delete them. Similarly, developers can create and use translations for customer specific column renames without worrying about breaking visuals and complicated data models.

Power BI - Creating a M-agical Date Table

By the end of this session, attendees will have a deeper understanding of how to manipulate M code in Power BI through the process of building a highly customized date table.

Many times Power BI developers get caught between DAX and SQL when they need the flexibility of DAX but the performance benefits of SQL, which leaves them in the land of M. Similar to Oz, M is full of magic that is more attainable than meets the eye. This session demystifies the functionality of Power Query and covers when Power Query may be the best option.

Mastering Microsoft Fabric Data Warehousing: Tips & Tricks You Need to Know

During this session, we’ll dive into a range of helpful tips and tricks that I wish I had known when starting out with Microsoft Fabric data warehouses. These insights are designed to save you time, optimize performance, and make managing your data warehouse more efficient.

We’ll start by exploring a clever trick to create a case-insensitive warehouse using a simple API call, a small adjustment that can have a significant impact on query consistency and usability. From there, we’ll tackle performance monitoring, focusing on identifying and addressing slow queries. You’ll learn how to leverage built-in tools and techniques to pinpoint bottlenecks and take corrective action.

But what happens when a rogue query threatens to cripple your capacity? Don’t worry, we’ll cover how to detect and kill capacity-destroying queries before they disrupt operations. This critical skill will ensure your data warehouse remains stable and responsive, even under heavy workloads.

Throughout the session, I’ll share practical, real-world examples and actionable strategies to help you get the most out of Microsoft Fabric. Whether you’re new to data warehousing or looking to sharpen your skills, this session is packed with valuable insights you can start using immediately.

Decoding Fabric Licensing

Embark on a journey through the layered landscape of Microsoft Fabric licensing, where cryptic SKUs, hidden costs, and mysterious capacities await. This session sheds light on the most misunderstood parts of the licensing maze, using real-world examples to bring clarity to the chaos. Whether you’re just starting to explore or deep into discovery, you’ll leave with the map you need to make confident, cost-savvy decisions.

Attendees of this session will leave knowing how to:
- Distinguish between Power BI Pro, Premium Per User (PPU), and Fabric SKUs
- Choose between Pay-As-You-Go and Reserved pricing (and when it matters)
- Estimate licensing costs with real-world scenarios and user personas
- Match capacity sizes (F SKUs) to your org’s workloads and needs
- Avoid common budgeting pitfalls and over-provisioning traps

Notebook Ninja: Best Practices for Building Reusable, Scalable Fabric Notebooks

Notebooks in Microsoft Fabric aren’t just for one-off scripts. They can be powerful, reusable, and modular building blocks in your data workflows. In this session, we’ll walk through best practices for building and organizing Fabric notebooks like a pro. Learn how to chain multiple notebooks using DAG-style execution, call notebooks with parameters and UDFs, and manage code reuse like a well-oiled data ops team. Whether you're orchestrating data engineering workflows or building shared libraries for your team, this session will give you the tools and patterns you need to level up your notebook game.

The Fellowship of the Star Schema: Transforming OLTP Data for Power BI

One does not simply build reports on OLTP data. Join us on an epic journey from the depths of raw, normalized tables to the shining halls of a well-modeled star schema fit for Power BI greatness. We’ll demystify the differences between OLTP and OLAP, reveal the secrets of dimensional modeling, and show you how to forge relationships (and maybe even a few Slowly Changing Dimensions) that rule them all. Whether you’re a data wizard, a curious hobbit, or somewhere in between, you’ll walk away with practical techniques to build models that are as powerful as the One Ring but far less corrupting.

Mastering Data Quality Validation in Fabric for Power BI Reports

Picture this: you’ve just inherited a Power BI report, and your task is to perform data quality checks. Simple enough, until you’re told that every measure in the report must be validated against the source database. Suddenly, what seemed like a straightforward task becomes a time-intensive challenge.

There are several ways to ensure the measures align with the source data, but the process needs to be efficient, repeatable, and, most importantly, self-documenting.

In this session, we'll walk through using Python notebooks in Microsoft Fabric to streamline the data quality validation process. Together, we’ll build a Python script that performs these checks in a single batch and logs any discrepancies for review. You’ll learn how to:
- Utilize Power BI REST APIs to access measures dynamically.
- Connect to a SQL Server database for real-time validation.
- Create a logging table to document differences automatically.

This method ensures consistency, saves time, and provides a clear audit trail for every data quality check. Whether you’re a data engineer or analyst, this hands-on approach will empower you to handle even the most complex validation tasks with ease.

Power BI Admin Level-Up: Leveraging Fabric to Manage Your Tenant

Have you ever wanted to build a custom usage metric report for your Power BI tenant, but didn’t know where to start? Or perhaps you’re a Power BI admin eager to explore how Microsoft Fabric can transform your workflows? If so, this session is exactly what you’ve been looking for!

In this hands-on session, I'll take you step-by-step through building a powerful usage metrics, access auditing, and semantic model failure exploration using Microsoft Fabric. You’ll learn how to create a Python notebook in Fabric that interacts with the Power BI REST APIs to pull critical tenant data like semantic model refreshes, workspace access, and usage. From there, we’ll learn how to structure and load this data into a Fabric Lakehouse, making it accessible for dynamic reporting.

But this session is more than just a technical tutorial, it’s about empowering you with the tools and techniques to unlock new possibilities for monitoring and optimizing your Power BI environment. By the end, you’ll have not only a fully functional monitoring report but also a clear understanding of how Fabric can revolutionize the way you manage and report on your Power BI tenant.