Štěpán Rešl
Power BI MVP | Managing partner & Lead technical consultant
Prague, Czechia
I am a data lover, especially in the ecosystem of Microsoft tools. I primarily focus on Power BI, Azure Synapse, and Azure SQL. In general, I follow a very simple motto.
"Don´t say it cannot be done, or someone who doesn´t know it will come and do it."
I am a co-founder and a Lead Technical Consultant at DataBrothers. We are Power BI experts and consultants with a focus on data analysis, reporting, and training in Power BI. We work with our clients across the globe on developing custom solutions and training their users on all levels (from business to development).
Awards
Area of Expertise
Topics
Fabric vs. Sharepoint - Extract your data as they should be
Although Sharepoint is not a database, many companies use it that way. It doesn't matter if we are talking about "files" or "lists." It is still a carrier of data we may need for further insight.
Today, we have three main ways to get this data into the Fabric environment. But which of them is optimal? Can I do the same in all three? Will we get all the data in the proper form? These and other questions are precisely the ones we will be interested in during this session.
So, what options do we have? Pipelines, Dataflows, and Notebooks. The last-mentioned variant can be exciting because, at that moment, you are not limited and can do anything with the obtained data.
Ready? Here we go!
Lessons learnt from PySpark Notebooks and extracting APIs
Notebooks inside Fabric are a high-speed solution for data transformation, and APIs are a great data source and are provided by many systems. So, it is great to have the ability to download and shape their data by PySpark for other Fabric purposes.
In this session, I will show my lessons learnt from Notebooks and API extractions. A session is aimed even for beginners who have never worked with APIs or Notebooks. I will show what libraries are required and how to create a User Define Function that can be very handy for more complex transformations.
Bring your data to the age of better visualization! Its age of SVG in Power BI
Although Power BI offers several native visuals, their capabilities are usually very limited. For this reason, many users are running away from native visuals to custom visuals. On the other hand, these may be prohibited entirely in many companies or limited to only certified ones.
Let's take advantage of it together to make your own SVG charts and bring them to life using native visuals. A life that will show your data in precisely the form you see fit! The form will convey what is needed. The way you have everything under your control!
As part of this training, we will produce different types of SVG together and then dynamically generate them using the DAX language so that we can use the data from the datasets to the fullest. In addition to classic sparklines, we will also focus on creating full-fledged KPI cards and entire visuals.
Built your own Power BI Admin report under 3 hours with Microsoft Fabric
Administering the Power BI Service may seem simple. But most of the time, this idea dissolves as soon as questions start popping up, such as: How many people send PDF subscriptions? Who exports data to Excel? Will we lose some content soon because we deleted users from AAD (Entra)?
The answers to these questions are a bit more complicated. They can always be obtained, but it takes some time if we want to do it manually. Thanks to the Power BI REST API, we can put many of these questions behind us because if we know how to ask such a thing, we will get the answers.
But what if we had a tool that directly asks our questions, we teach it, and then we can consume the answers... for example, a report? That's much better. Thanks to Microsoft Fabric, we have all the necessary components in one place, so let's dive in together and create a report ourselves.
Usage Metrics of Power BI Reports and how to get my data for longer time
If we work to make the message look great, and everything works as it should, then it's a big shame if it's not used. But do we have any way to find out? YES! That way is the Usage Metric Report, which is a native part of the Power BI and Fabric world, respectively. But it has its problems that it faces and that need to be solved, such as the absence of data older than 30 days or the fact that the data is always only for one workspace.
Can these problems be solved somehow? YES! You don't even need to have an Admin role to do this. But what exactly are our options, what do we need, and how can we achieve the desired result? This is precisely the subject of this session.
In this session, I will discuss Power BI / Fabric API, PowerShell, PySpark notebook, datasets, and potential reports.
PowerShell Hacks for Power BI
There's never a dull moment in the life of a Power BI Administrator. In order to protect our time and sanity, it's important to automate as many of our usual tasks and processes as possible. Additionally, since the top priority of the Power BI development team is the end user experience, there are many edge cases and "power user" type activities that cannot yet be accomplished using only Power BI Desktop and the Power BI web service. Fortunately, Microsoft has provided two priceless tools that allow us to automate and add functionality to Power BI: The Power BI REST APIs and the MicrosoftPowerBIMgmt module for PowerShell. This presentation will demonstrate several techniques for harnessing these powerful tools to make your job as a Power BI Administrator less time-consuming and more fun!
Personal Workspaces in times of Fabric
Personal Workspaces are a neglected part of the Fabric and Power BI world. We know they are there, but we rarely use them. Actually... should we use them at all? What purpose does it serve? Are they safe?
Let's look at them together, identify scenarios where they are helpful, and how we can work with them and think about them within our architecture. Let's not curse them but watch over them. After all... you can't turn them off!
Fabric Domains
With the arrival of Microsoft Fabric came a lot of news into the world of Power BI Service (Fabric Service)! One such innovation about governance and the overall grasp of workspaces and their content is Domains. Domains allow us to assign workspaces and their content under one entity. That can be handy for many good reasons. Like for example, we can budget which part of the organization has to pay how much for Premium capacity.
But you need to understand them and carefully prepare their segmentation for your company. To better understatement, we will talk about what they are, their roles, their other impacts, and their auditing.
Extracting data from Power BI datasets
Today we use Power BI daily. We prepare reports, dashboards, consume applications and scorecards.
We can go much further thanks to specific options, such as Power BI. REST API. What if we didn't have to go to Power BI for data, but what if we came directly to the chat in MS Teams? It wouldn't be great to wake up in the morning with the summary answers you need waiting for you in one place. Or what If we would be able to generate invoices, issues, KPIs and more based directly on data from our Power BI models?
How to do it? Come and find out! ExecuteQueries endpoint is waiting just for you!
API as a Source for Power Query
Our data is often hidden behind some API, and we have to get it out to make a report. But we can encounter many obstacles along the way. One such "obstacle" is putting the obtained data into a table at all, solving pagination, and then how to solve Dynamic Datasource or how to prevent it altogether. In addition, it is necessary to know that the API may ask us for various other elements in the header or HTTP Query.
But don't worry! It's not rocket science. Together, we'll introduce the necessary concepts to understand both inside Power Query and from the perspective of the API as such, and I'll show you that pulling data from the API is quite simple.
Level-Up your Power Query game with Custom Functions
Functions are one of the fundamental building blocks of Power Query. In addition to the native ones, we can create our own so that we don't have to write everything repeatedly. Custom functions can be one of your best friends for making your work easier in Power Query. But you need to be able to create them and set the input parameters, including whether they are mandatory or optional.
But once we create the function, it doesn't end there! To pass the function to someone or not forget what it does, it is good to know how to add documentation metadata that will be displayed in the preview of the function and used for quick understanding.
Start building custom functions and advance your Power Query capabilities.
Manipulation with hierarchies in Power BI
Power BI can work with different hierarchies. But what options do we have to deal with them? There are quite a few scenarios. A typical scenario is the Parent-Child hierarchy, which is familiar in almost every organization within a role hierarchy. Sometimes, however, it is not so simple, and M:N hierarchies also need to be addressed. This does not have to exist only within roles and, for example, the substitutability of roles, but also on the business scene. Or you can have a merchant who manages a customer and should be able to see all trades made with the customer and, on the other hand, should be able to see only his sales for all customers. In scenarios like this, things get interesting! So let's not make two datasets unnecessarily, if possible otherwise, and unlock the potential of hierarchies to the maximum. Let's use them within visuals, RLS, calculations, and relationships.
Hack the Matrix (Power BI)
One of the basic visuals in Power BI. Anyone working with Power BI for a while has come into contact with it. But how does it work, and how can we use it to get the most out of it? Both in terms of graphics and content.
As part of this session, of course, we cannot do without DAX studio, which will help us to reveal and hack the matrix down to the last foundation.
Data-driven alerts in Power BI
Data inside datasets are great for populating the content of Power BI Reports. But how to bring this content closer to the users in the environment where they work every day? This is already an exciting task where the Power BI REST API can significantly help us. Of course, before talking about it, we must know all the options by which Power BI communicates with us, so we know which one we can reach for when. When none of them are enough, the aforementioned API comes into play.
Using Power Automate or Logic Apps, PowerShell, or any other means, we can query our data and work with it further. At that point, DAX becomes our primary language that looks for answers. But together, we will show how to get these answers to people right up to their chat in MS Teams using Power Automate.
Power BI REST API with Power Query optics
Valuable pieces of information are hidden inside Power BI REST API (not just Admin one), such as when the data set was updated. Who has access to it, or what settings the data set has? But how do we get them to work with them in Power Query? What do we need to set up and create within Azure?
DAX tweaks for graphical diversification of the report
Nobody likes confusing and illegible reports. How can DAX help us make reports more dynamic and graphically eloquent? We will focus on this in this lecture. In addition to the elements found in Power BI, we will also look at the superstructure in the Tabular Editor or the solution using Calculation Groups.
Topics:
- The dynamic ratio of TOPN products sold to all others for individual sellers
- Showing Data Labels by set parameter
- First & Last Values of Line Chart
- Active category label next to the end of a line in Line Chart
- Highest & Lowest value in the Column Chart
Fabric February 2024 Upcoming
CZ/SK Power Platform User Group Meetup User group
SQL Server Bootcamp 2021
No more boring Power BI reports
Nobody likes to read boring reports. So why not make them more exciting and lively? How can DAX help us make reports more dynamic and graphically eloquent? Sometimes it is necessary to look at it from a different perspective and, for example, use the Tabular Editor to push it to places where it will not look in the power you have modified in Power BI itself. The lecture will analyze and demonstrate several examples of how DAX in conjunction with Calculation Groups, but even without them, can cheat classic reports.
Power Break
Nobody likes confusing and illegible reports. How can DAX help us make reports more dynamic and graphically eloquent? We will focus on this in this lecture. In addition to the elements found in Power BI, we will also look at the superstructure in the Tabular Editor or the solution using Calculation Groups.
Topics:
– The dynamic ratio of TOPN products sold to all others for individual sellers
– Showing Data Labels by set parameter
– First & Last Values of Line Chart
– Active category label next to the end of a line in Line Chart
– Highest & Lowest value in the Column Chart
Power BI Day CZ - DAX for better UX&UI of Reports
Power BI Day 2021 ONLINE is a Czech-Slovak conference where you can look forward to lectures by TOP Czech and Slovak experts on trendy Power BI topics. The conference will be appreciated not only by data analysts or financial managers, but all those who work with data and reports at a more advanced level need to be able to process, decipher and interpret them clearly.
How 2020 changed Power BI beyond recognition
In the lecture, you will learn about how the year 2020 completely changed Power BI, as we knew it. We will talk about Calculation Groups or DirectQuery for live data sources, we will show you how to use them and what has been added to graphic innovations such as point selection or Azure Map Visual.
SQL Server Bootcamp 2020 - Dataflow as a transformation treasure in Power BI Service
Dataflow is a tool that is very often dormant in companies, although it certainly does not have to be asleep and can help a lot with data preparation and report stability. During the lecture, the Dataflow will be rebuilt from the very beginning, including working with it. Since Dataflow works as a tool within the Power BI Service, the data storage will be introduced, where the processed data is stored and how it can be accessed. Dataflow is subject to certain restrictions that are good to consider.
SQL Server Bootcamp 2020 - Time Intelligence and its effects on the model in Power BI
Power BI has a two-pronged function called Time Intelligence. On the one hand, it can facilitate date calculations created using the DAX language, but on the other hand, it can cause an unexpected size of the .pbix file, due to spontaneously occurring date dimensions.
Czech SQL Pass - Dataflow as an entrance into world of CDM
Štěpán and I will go through Dataflow from the beginning. Including an explanation of where the data is stored and how it can be accessed. Let's talk about when it pays to use dataflow and what are their limitations, especially for PRO licenses. We will explain how Dataflow helps the whole concept of the Microsoft Power Platform and why it is the gateway to enter the world of CDM.