Power BI Report Filtering Options - Snack 17

There are multitude of ways and means to filter in Power BI.  A few snacks back, we talked about how the visualizations can filter one another. Additionally, specific visuals can be included for nothing more than filtering.  If you scan through the visualizaiton icons, you will find such filter called "Slicer."

Slicer enables you to choose a datapoint or set of datapoints to use in filtering the page.

Let's try it out.  Access your report and jump into EDIT mode.

1. Click out in the blank space so that you are sure to have nothing selected.
2. Find and click the SLICER visualization under the Visualizations tab.
3. Drag and drop SEGMENT from the Data Panel into the Visualization Panel Field
1. You should see the visualization populate with the market segments.
1. Click the boxes and watch the changes
2. Unclick all boxes
4. Format your visual
1. Under Slicer Settings, you will see that this visual has three.
1. Vertical List
2. Tile
3. Drop Down
2. Cycle through them and see what happens
3. Choose Drop Down when done playing around
1. As with other visuals there are other modifications you can make it look just how you like.
5. Move and Size your visual to make the most of the space on the page.
6. SAVE!!

You are probably thinking you can squeeze a lot onto the page and manipulate quite a bit with filters.  

That is correct, but it can get busy, and space is limited.  Eventually you will find yourself lacking sufficient real estate, especially when your users start telling you how they would really prefer to slice and dice your report.

That is where the Filter Panel comes in handy.  This is always present and can be populated in any way for a single visual, a single page, or every single page in the report.  You can guess what they by their section name in the Filter Panel.

Try it out!

1. Click in the blank space of your report again to ensure nothing is selected.
2. Drag and drop the following fields from the data panel to the little box under "Filter on all pages"
1. Date
2. Discount Band
3. Product
4. Segment
3. SAVE!!

There only a couple of parameters you can mess with on these. 

• Require single selection
• This will force the user to choose only one item, though they can still CTRL+Click to choose more.
• Filter type
• Basic filtering
• Offers a list of choices
• Advanced filtering
• Offers a sort of query view enabling more exacting choices
• Relative Date & Relative Time
• Only available for Date fields
• Enables a user to choose a period
• In the last ... however many whatever
• In this ... whatever
• In the next ... however many whatever
• requires futures dates

You can also hide these filters, which is useful if you want to present a very specific view for a visual or for a particular page.  Hover over the cards in the Filter panel and you will see tiny little icons that enable you to ...

• Expand or collapse filter card
• Remove (the filter card)
• Lock (the filter so it cannot be changed)
• Hide (nobody can see this filter card when it is published)

That is all we have for today.  Happy Filtering!

Screenshot includes the Filter panel this time for reference. 

Power BI Formatting Report Visuals - Snack 16

You probably noticed a few things about the visuals added that you probably do not care for.  Or at least, whomever you are building the report will not want to see.

The little table has values that go down to the penny, which is usually not needed for financials.  The "Sum of Profit" visual says "Sum of Profit," which is not particularly descriptive.

The visual that we added last time is titled, "Sum of Sales, Sum of Gross Sales and Sum of Profit by Year and Quarter."  While that is relatively descriptive, it is not exactly what we want there.  Also, the titles on the X/Y axis seem a little redundant, displaying information that is already highly visible.

This is where formatting the visual comes in and can be very useful in making things look just the way our audience would rather it appear.

Let's slip into EDIT mode on your report and make a few changes.

There are few things to know first that will really help.

After selecting a visualization, when you choose "Format your visual" under Visualizations, there are two tabs under that, "Visual" and "General."

• Visual Tab is for adjusting just about anything related to the presentation of the graphics and the data displayed inside visualization.
• General Tab is for adjusting the overall appearance of the visual, such as its size, shape, color, and other effects.

Also notice that there is a Search box at the top of those two points. There are so many adjustments that can be made to visuals that it can be a little difficult to find the right setting sometimes.  Look for them using this search box.

I am not going to make you do that today.  For now ... 

• Click the Table visual to select it for modification
• Under the Visualizations panel, 
• Choose "Format your visual" (NOTE:  To adjust the decimal, we can go two directions
• Visual Tab (adjusts the decimal places for this specific column in this visualization)
• Choose "Specific Column"
• From the drop-down under "Apply settings to"
• Choose Series "Sum of Gross Sales"
• Expand Values
• Change "Value decimal places" to "0"
• General Tab (adjusts the decimal places for this data point anywhere it appears in this visualization)
• Data Format
• Under "Apply settings to"
• Choose "Sum of Sales"
• Expand Format Options
• Format = "Whole number"
• Turn ON the "Thousands separator"
• NOTE:  You might need to expand your visual now and/or expand the column size, lest the wrap themselves.  We already covered how to do that.
• Click the Card visual to select it for modification
• Double-click the column name under "Fields" 
• Rename to "Profit"
• Click on that Bar Graph visual to select it for modification
• Under the Visualization panel, 
• Choose "Format your visual"
• Visual Tab
• Expand X-Axis
• Turn "Title" off
• Expand Y-Axis
• Turn "Title" off
• General Tab
• Expand "Title"
• in the "Text" box, type "Gross Sales vs Sales vs Profit"
• FILE
• SAVE

Again, there are a multitude of settings under "Format your visual."

There is a safety net for each of these settings too.  

After making an adjustment on any particular setting, "Reset to default" will light up and that setting can be restored to its original state.  Try it out.  You can always exit and come back without saving.

That is all for this round!  See you next time.

Tao Verse 10

Hold fast to the Power of the One