CORI, my new App

Completely and accidentally, I named my own Power BI application today.  It started with me trying to give it a title that emphasized exactly what it is, a "Consolidated Organizational Reporting Interface."

It is a word salad of sorts, but after staring it for a moment, I realized it had a name.  "CORI."  Now it just needs representation.

I could have designed something but that would have taken weeks.  AI to the rescue.  Gemini failed and I was truly disappointed, after having considered it much more creative than my other alternative.

Copilot offered up the following results, which were much better than I anticipated. The header image on this post is what Gemini came up with, and could do no better with additional prompts.

Copilot response (above):  Generated.

When asked, "What if it looked like a person?"

Copilot Response (image above):  I generated a personified version of CORI as a professional reporting and analytics ambassador.

I prompted further, "Can you make it race neutral?"

Copilot Response (image above):  I've generated a more neutral, stylized corporate mascot version of CORI that avoids strongly emphasizing any specific demographic characteristics while keeping the professional analytics-focused branding.

I further prompted, "Is is possible to go more gender neutral?"

Copilot Response (image above):  Yes. A better approach for a corporate reporting platform mascot is often to move away from a human altogether and use a branded character.  I generated a version where CORI is represented as a neutral data-avatar/mascot built from the brand colors and analytics theme. This avoids drawing attention to gender, race, age, or other personal characteristics and tends to work better for organization-wide branding.

Overtime Reallocation

Executive Summary

This report enables a high-level view of overtime usage across the organization, showing total hours, overtime percentage, and trends over time. It highlights which locations, employees, and position codes drive overtime, enabling leaders to pinpoint where labor inefficiencies exist and focus on targeted operational improvements. Additional pages, beyond the above Executive Summary, are displayed below.

This effort was a little different than most, hence the "Reallocation" identifier in the title.

What does that mean?

Regular hours are allocated primary‑location first up to 40 hours/week, with any remaining regular time spread proportionally across secondary locations. Overtime (hours >40) stays at the location worked. This preserves where work actually occurred while ensuring consistent weekly rules and accurate cost allocation across locations.

Location Detail

Employee Detail

This is the very first report produced solely upon the support of Microsoft Copilot and proved quite a challenge keeping the AI on track and focused.  

Power BI Report Mobile Layout - Snack 20

In this mobile world, you might want to enable a cleaner view of reporting for those interested in accessing reports through the Power BI app.

You didn't know there is an App for that?

There is indeed.  Look it up in your favorite app store and access all of your reports on the go, after we get this ready, of course.

Let's get going ... 

1)  Jump into your report and switch to EDIT mode.

2)  Click "Mobile Layout," at the top of the screen, just underneath the title of the report.

-   A screen appears offering the opportunity to "Create a mobile layout."

-  Do NOT click that button that says "Auto-create mobile layout."

-  Try that some other time.

On the right of the screen are two panels, "Page Visuals" and "Visualizations."

The "Page Visuals" panel displays all the elements from the report created.

The "Visualizations" panel enables you to modify the element for better visibility in mobile view, without impacting the original desktop display you created.  To do so, click the element you want to adjust, and the panel will populate with options available for modification.

3) From the "Page Visuals" panel, click, drag & drop the little boxes out onto the white area that looks like mobile device.

-  Take them one at a time.  When they appear on the mobile device layout, gray handles appear enabling you to resize and reposition the element. Position and size it, then move on to the next.

-  It will not let you stretch off screen, thankfully.  

-  It will let you lay them over the top of each other though, so beware of that.

-  Hover over and scroll on the mobile device layout to get more real estate.  

4)  File > Save

-  To get back to the original Desktop Layout View, click the icon in the lower left of the screen that looks like a computer screen.  

 

. . .

I hope you enjoyed tagging along with this little exercise.   This concludes the last regular installment of these little snacks.  There will be other editions, just not quite as frequent, I think.  You never know.

There is a lot more that can be done in Power BI.  We hit all the core elements though.

Everything else can be figured out by clicking around, asking around the interwebs, or your favorite Artificial Idiot (AI).  The latter is usually right, most of the time.  You know how it is.  You are doing 100% better if you figure it on your own though.

Microsoft hosts an excellent support community (Power BI forums - Microsoft Fabric Community).  The folks over there can answer just about any question or at least work through figuring it out with you.

Additionally, Guy in a Cube on YouTube is an excellent resource for tips, tricks, demos, feature reviews and really digging into the guts of Power BI, and they are more interesting than most.

Power BI Formulas and Calculations - Snack 19

Today, let's talk a bit about Calculations aka Formulas, which are called Measures in Power BI.  They are not a whole lot different than their counterparts in Excel.  There are some distinct differences though and too many to discuss in this forum.

Everything done in the report so far is nice but does not address one concern.

    What if the data does not display some calculation or another?  

We have to add it ourselves.

    Do we add it to the original spreadsheet before we connect the spreadsheet?  

You can but it is not quite as efficient.

    What if we do not think about this calculation until after we have already connected it? 

That is what we are about to talk about.

    Can a calculation be added to our spreadsheet after we have connected it to Power BI?

Yes, but it is awkward at best.

The best way to handle this situation is to do nothing with your original spreadsheet.  Best practice is to keep your original data as it was originally sourced and just do a little coding.

    Wait a minute, I did not bargain for that!  

Don't worry.  It is relatively easy, and I am going to tell you exactly what to do.

Let's say for instance that you want to know the difference Sales and Gross Sales.

In Power BI Online,

1) Access the report we have been working on.

2) Choose EDIT

3) Choose OPEN SEMANTIC MODEL (a button on the top row)

The view will change to a little table showing all of the table columns.  There will be a green bar at the top that says, "You are in Viewing mode and changes will not be saved." 

4) Switch to EDITING by selecting the green menu button in the very top right of the screen that currently says "Viewing"

BEWARE! Keep in mind your changes will be permanent and automatically saved. 

5)  Right-Click on the table name in the Data Pane on the right.

6) Select "New Measure"

A new box appears at the top of our space with red check box and a green check box which says "Measure =       "

In the following steps, we are going to put in the following measure:

    Sales Difference = SUM(financials[Gross Sales])-SUM(financials[ Sales])

Pay close attention to what is happening as you type. 

7) In the Measure box type "Sales Difference =" over the top of "Measure =" 

Nothing happens. Hrmm.

8) Type "SUM" then press <TAB>

Notice that as soon as you began to type, a drop-down of options appears.  Those are other expressions that you can use.  We are only going with SUM for right now.

Also notice that a "(" was added automatically for you when you hit <TAB>

9) Type "Gr ..."

The name of that column from the table appears suddenly

10) Press <ENTER>

11) Type ")" to close the argument.

Sorry.  It does not know when to stop, so you have to tell it.

So far, we should look like "SUM(financials[Gross Sales])."

That is not enough to get us there.

12) Type "-"

Nothing happens.

13) Type "SUM" and press <TAB>

14) Type "Sales"

Now we have a problem.  There are two to choose from.  We already used one of them though, so that narrows things down.

15) Click the one titled "financials[ Sales]"

16) Type ")" to close the argument.

17) Press <ENTER>

If you did everything right, you should Power BI "Working on it ..." and then your Measure will appear in that box, without any errors or weird red lines underneath parts of it.  If it has those things, erase it and start over.

If you cannot get it to work.  Grab the full formula above and paste it in that box instead.

18) Switch back to "Viewing" mode by clicking that little button in the top right of your screen that currently says "Editing."

Notice that there now appears to be a column in the table for "Sales Difference."  It is actually only a formula that will consistently calculate the difference between those two columns everywhere you use it.  It will act like a column but really is not.  It is only pretending.

What we have done is tell Power BI that every time we drop in this little pretend column, we want it to calculate the SUM of Gross Sales, calculate the SUM of Sales, then subtract the latter from the former.  Easy, right?

You can now go back to your report and use this little formula anywhere you like; well, most anywhere.  That is another story for another time though.

A couple of other related stories are New Columns and Visual Calculations.

When we first started with this, about the time of the right-click, you probably noticed you can also add "New Column."  That is a whole different situation than what we just did, though it can work much the same, though on a row-by-row basis.

What is the difference?  

Days of argument over which is more suitable for conditions in the report.

Stick with DAX for now.

Oh, I probably forgot to mention, that is what "code" we were writing.

While a lot of others try to define catalogs of the various expressions available for DAX, Microsoft has their own and is probably more reliable than others.

Data Analysis Expressions (DAX) Reference - DAX | Microsoft Learn

You might also discover or someone else may also tell you that you can simply use a "Visual Calculation."

You can.  It is easier.

Understand that they only apply to the visual selected though and cannot be reused easily.

That is the best I can frighten you on this Halloween.  

Happy Measuring!

Power BI Report Titling - Snack 18

It feels like the only thing really missing from this little report is perhaps some sort of title.

Let's add one!

1) Jump into EDIT mode on the report.

2) Click "Text Box" at the top of the screen.

A box appears with an accompanying Format Box.  If you have any experience at all with Microsoft Word, you already know what to do here.

3) Give the report a title by typing into that text box.

4) Choose whatever formatting options make you happy.

Simple, right?

However, suppose for a moment that you or the person(s) accessing the report would like a date on the report that reflects whatever year, month or day is selected.

That little Format Box is more powerful than you realize.

5) In that Format Box, click "Value."

The format box expands so that you can "Create a dynamic value that updates with your data."

This is where you really to know your data and how you might query it to answer the first question in that box, "How would you calculate this value."

It also helps to know how Power BI wants you to ask this question.  Sometimes, you have to play around with the word order to get it to do what you want.  I already did that for you here.

6) Type in that box "Latest Date Financials"

7) An option displaying the very same thing you type should appear below that.   Choose it!

Just below that, where says "Results," you should see "12/1/2014"

Beneath that is a drop-down to choose how to display that result and other associated formatting options.

Finally, the box at the bottom enables naming the value.  This is handy if you have a lot of different values driving that title and/or description and need to keep them all straight.  You can literally write an entire diagnosis in that text box, using nothing but defined values.

Let's leave that last one as #Value for now.

8) Click Save on the Formatting Box.

The date should appear in your text box.

You might need to format it to match any text you placed before that.

9) File

10) Save

Let's test it out.  Click on "Qtr 2" in the bar graph and the date just created should change to 6/1/2014.  If it did not, start over. 

Fun, huh?

You can also add many of the options that visualizations have to that text box. If you have it selected, what is normally the Visualizations Pane has become the Format Text Box Pane.  That is not the same formatting just covered; it is for the box itself.

That is all I got this week.  

While it feels like that is all that is left to do, we still got a few things to talk about, so look for another episode soon.

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.

Power BI Report Chart Visual - Snack 15

That last visual proved interesting.  Let's add something a bit more interactive.

Jump into EDIT mode on your report.

Ensure you do not have anything select by clicking in the blank space.

A quick double-check is to look at the "Build Visual" section of the Visualizations pane.  "Values" should display nothing more than "Add data fields here."

Let's do that.

1. Drag-and-Drop the date field to that little box.
1. A new visual should appear with the date
2. It is broken out by Year, Month, Quarter, Day.
1. That is good.
2. Do the same and Add Sales.
1. You should be able to Drag-and-Drop it just below the Date portion.
3. Add Gross Sales.
4. Add Profit.
1. We are back to a boring table.
5. Under the Visualizations pane, 
1. click on the icon for "Line and clustered column chart."
1. The boring table should change to a fancy bar chart.
1. If it does, great!
2. If it does not, and only a new blank visualization appears, that means your table was not selected when you clicked that icon.  Select your table visual and try again.
1. You can also select the other blank visual, hit that little ". . ." menu and choose to remove it.
6. Stretch out your new visual so you can see more of it.
1. It is probably only displaying 2 years columns, and how come there is a line on the icon and none on the chart?
7. Return to the Visualizations pane,
1. click and drag "Sum of Profit" down to where it says, "Add data fields here" in the section beneath that for "Line-y axis."
1. Ta-Da!  We have a line!
2. Still a little boring though.
8. Hover over the visual.
1. Click the icon that looks like two down arrows that split into two.
9. Save.

That's better.  Your screen should look relatively similar to the screenshot.

Make absolutely sure you saved before reading on.

Did you SAVE?

Are you sure?

You should probably exit and come back into the report to ensure you do not muss anything.

There is no exit.  I am not sure why.  Close the tab.

Access the report again.

Now, about the arrows ... 

The arrows enable you to interact with the visual, as well as set the default appearance.

When I first started helping folks out with using Power BI, I made a little cheat sheet for these little icons that shows up below.

Play around with the arrows to better understand how they work.

Power BI Report Card Visual - Snack 14

That little table we made is nice.  It would be better if it were a little more reactive to changing conditions in the report.

What does that mean, anyway?

As mentioned previously, Power BI is not meant to simply display plain old ordinary data in the same plain old ordinary way that Excel does it.  What would be the point of that?  It is meant to offer opportunities for manipulation, interactivity, and self-service analysis.

Let's jump into EDIT mode on our report and I will show you what I mean.

1. Select the table visualization that we created last time.
2. Right-Click
1. Copy
2. Copy visual
3. On the keyboard <CTRL>+V
1. A copy of the table should appear
4. Grab the new visual and drag it out of the way somewhere but keep it selected.
5. In the Visualizations pane,
1. Click on "Card," which looks like a little box with a "1 2 3" inside.
2. It should change your table to plain white box with 127.93M inside.
6. File -> Save

So, what is this showing?

Look over in the Visualizations and see that there is only one item in your Fields section.  It should be displaying the same number as "Sum of Gross Sales," though abbreviated.

Most folks looking at this sort of thing are probably not interested in gross sales though.  Let's go ahead and change to what everyone really cares about, profit!

Make sure you still have that visual selected, and ...

Drag and drop the [Profit] field from the Data pane into the Fields section of the Visualizations pane.

We started off saying something interactivity though.

Click each of the years in your table in turn now.  

The card visual will change to match your selection.

We can look simply at sales as a table, with profit independent of that in another visual.

This enables me to drop [Profit] out of that table now, since we have it showing up somewhere else.

If you want, if you still have the visual selected, you can visit the "Format visual" tab under the Visualizations pane and change the look and feel to fit your taste.

Otherwise, that is all we have today!  I am hoping to get these out a little earlier in the day on Friday, since it has become more of the catch-up-and-learn-things day for the workforce.

Hold on a minute!!!

There is some sort of little triangle with an exclamation point above the card!  

That doesn't look good.

It is not doing any damage.  It is because we copied the table visual to create another visual.

If you hover over that icon, it will tell you what is going on. 

This is a bug Microsoft recently introduced that is a super annoying.  It seems that they failed to recognize that this copy/paste of visuals happens all the time.  I mean, who wants build everything from scratch?  

Looks like you are going to get to "Format visual" anyway.

To fix that little issue, go over to the Visualizations pane and switch to "Format visual."  That is the one with the paintbrush icon over the bars.  Change your "Style presets" to "Default."  It goes away.  The option for "Style presets" go away too.  

Ain't that fancy?   

Don't forget to SAVE one more time.

Oh, and going forward, the image attached will be my final screen.

Power BI Report Question - Snack 13

For any true analytics to occur, we really need a question.

We cannot just give answers to questions that do not exist.

Sometimes, we have to come up with our own questions too, on top of what has already been asked. 

Other times, we are just given a bunch of data and told to make sense of it.

That is where we are now.

Let's start simple.

What are year-to-year Sales totals and what is our Profit from those Sales?

We could answer that with the table we have, but there is entirely too much noise in there.

We should pair that down into something useful that actually answers that question and gives us some space to answer other questions.

Get into your report and jump into EDIT mode. 

Under the Columns in the Visualization pane, you have a list of all of your columns.

If you have not noticed before, there is a little "x" next to each one. That enables you to remove the column from your visualization, which is our table, in this case.

You can also grab ahold of each one of those little boxes and reorder them (drag-n-drop).

Based on what you already know, see if you can figure out how to make yours look just like that in the screenshot.

You will need to ...

• Add a field
• Remove multiple fields
• Change the style on your table.
• Change how a field is displayed
• Save the report.

OK.  Here's what you need to do ...

• Add the Year column to the beginning of your list of columns
• Change the Year column to "Do not summarize"
• Move "Sum of Gross Sales" behind the "Year" column
• Move "Sum of Sales" behind that column
• Move "Sum of Profit" behind that column
• Change the visualization Style Preset to "Alternating Rows"
• File
• Save

If you are unable to figure it out, message me and I will give you a hand.

Power BI Report SUM - Snack 12

Welcome back!  It is time to talk maths for a moment.  There is a bit here that is kind of important to know.

If you are using the same fields I am, you will notice something a little unusual at the top of the Table visual that we put together.  Many of the columns begin with "Sum of ...," instead of simply stating the column name.

What does that mean?

It means that it is summarizing that column. It is not the same as adding, but it is.  It is not the same function as Excel, but it is.

I know, that is not exactly helpful.

Well, it is not exactly easy to explain either.

Hopefully, this example will help.

If I have multiple Sales entries on a certain date, it will only show the total of those entries on that date for all of the attributes chosen.

Still confused?

If we only had the one attribute "Sale Amount?" it would summarize that.  Consider these entries.

    6/1/2014 - $3
    6/1/2014 - $2
    6/1/2014 - $6
    7/1/2014 - $4

Using this data, our table would likely appear as follows:

    6/1/2014 - $11
    7/1/2014 - $4

Of course, if you added another attribute to that, such as Country, it would appear differently.  Consider these entries.

    6/1/2014 - $4 - Canada
    6/1/2014 - $1 - France
    6/1/2014 - $5 - France
    7/1/2014 - $2 - Canada

Using this data, our table would likely appear as follows:

    6/1/2014 - $4 - Canada
    6/1/2014 - $6 - France
    7/1/2014 - $2 - Canada

What if I do not want to summarize that data?  What if you want an Average, Median, Standard Deviation, Variance, or some other standard statistical representation?

Get back into your report and ...

1. Choose "Edit" mode
2. Select the Visualization
3. In the Visualization Pane,
1. Click the tiny down arrow next to "Sum of Sales"
1. A somewhat lengthy menu appears, with a checkmark next to "Sum."
2. Choose "Don't Summarize" and watch the results change.
3. Go back and choose any of the other options below that.
4. Try them all if you like.
1. Keep in mind what was just explained.
4. DO NOT SAVE!

Basically, this is how we define the appearance of our data in the visualization.

Most of the time, we are going to want it to "Sum."

There are times, and types of data, that you do not want to "Sum" or cannot "Sum" without some other calculation.

If you choose any of the columns that host text values, you will notice that they do not offer the option to "Sum."  Those only offer First, Last, Count, or Count (Distinct) and that is but one example.  There are others.

Think about how you would use this with your data, and we will come back to it another time.

Power BI Report and Semantic Model Naming - Snack 11

While thinking about what would be next for this series, I went to access the report we have been working on and found the proper topic before even opening the report.

If you have been following along and using the same sample dataset, you might have noticed a small inconsistency in naming between the Report and the Semantic Model.  This is captured in the screen shot above.  

Yours may or may not have this issue.  If it doesn't, aren't you lucky!?

I am not entirely certain what happened here, and it is mostly irrelevant.  

Usually, whenever you create/publish to the Power BI service, the name used for the report will be exactly the same as the Semantic Model.  For whatever reason, it did not this time.

This kind of bothers me.  I prefer that both names match so that they remained paired up and intend to rename both of them to "Financial Sample."

This can be done within the service and not impact anything.  They will remain connected.

How do we do that?

Access "My workspace," and ...

For the Report,

1. Hover over the row with the report name
1. A ". . ." menu appears next to the report name.
2. Click the " . . . " menu
3. Choose settings
1. Here you can choose to
1. Name / Rename the Report
2. Give the Report a Description
3. Add Contact Information
4. Choose an Endorsement for the report
5. Multiple other useful settings
4. Rename the Report
5. Save

And for the Semantic Model,

1. Hover over the name of the Semantic Model
1. A ". . ." menu appears next to the report name.
2. Click the " . . . " menu
3. Choose "Rename"
4. Rename your Dataset name aka Semantic Model.
5. Save

That is really all there is to it.  To me, everything looks much cleaner now and my mind immediately recognizes that these two are connected.  I do not have to waste any though on that.  Hopefully, it helps you too.

Power BI Report Table Visual Style - Snack 10

Hopefully, you got things all sorted out in that last session.

Yes. Pun intended.  

For this tenth edition, let's try and make that table visual look a bit easier on the eyes.

I do not care too much about table looks until well into the design.  We have reached a bit of a milestone though. 

Go ahead and jump right into "Edit" mode with your report and select your table visual.

Remember that when the visual is selected, all of the columns chosen for that visual will appear within the Visualizations pane.

Looking at top of that pane, there should be 3 icons.  The first is selected by default.  

Hover over the second icon and it says, "Format your visual."

Click it!

A list of options appears, the first of which is "Style presets"

Click the little ">" appearing next to that and a drop-down appears for "Style." 

Try them all out and see which one brings you the greatest satisfaction.

I tend to lean on "Alternative rows" for everything. 

After you decide on one that makes you happy, notice the choice underneath.

"Reset to default" will restore all changes for "Style presets" back to their original state.

Each of the choices in this arena have that option, which can be very helpful at times, if you just want to start over with one piece of the formatting.

Play with all of the options in this panel, if you like.  We are not going to cover them just now.  In the interest of keeping you as captivated as humanly possible, it will better deal with them, when we actually need them.

That is all we have for this week.  Happy formatting!

Power BI Report Sorting - Snack 9

Welcome back to snack time!  This one will be a little lighter than the past several.   Today, we are just going to do a little sorting.

Let's get back to our report.  Remember that you have it stored in "My Workspace."

Looking at our table, we probably want that sorted differently, or maybe we don't.

Sometimes we have the data just as we want it and prefer to leave it to the user to do the sorting.

Hovering the column names in the Table visualization, a little black arrow appears beneath the column name.  It points in the direction that data is currently sorted.

• Click on a column to sort that column.
• Click it again to sort the other way.
• Shift-Click to include another column in the sorting. 
• This sort the first column chosen, then the second column.
• Shift-Click the second column again to sort that second column in the other direction.
• Shift-Click to include a third, fourth, or fifth column.

None of this will remain this way.  The default view dictates otherwise.

In order to establish the default sort on this visualization, you will need to access "Edit" mode, sort the visualization as you would prefer it to display using the methods above, then "Save."  Your chosen sort will be the default display.

Another option, if you only one column sort is required, choose the ". . ." menu at the top right of the visual, then choose "Sort by," then the field you want to sort on.

Notice that above "Sort by" is "Sort Ascending" and "Sort Descending."

That is all for today!  Happy Sorting!

Power BI Report Theme Change - Snack 8

Last time we visited, we addressed the formatting of the Date column.  

It got a little ugly, but hopefully everything worked out for you.

Getting back to My Workspace in Power BI, let's see what else we need to do.

Go ahead an open your report; again, mine is called "FinancialSample."

There are multiple things that stand out about the data.  However, the table visual itself does not seem to stand out too well.  It is difficult to discern where that visual begins and where it ends.  

Let's fix that!

The more that you use Power BI, the more you will find that it is extremely helpful to know exactly where those visualization boundaries are.

Viewing your report in My Workspace in Power BI, 

1. Choose "Edit" from the top menu
2. In Edit mode,
1. Choose View
2. Choose Theme
1. A window should appear with some rather colorful themes.
2. I know you really want to choose your own, but for these demo purposes, 
3. Find the one with the blue background.
1. If you hover over that one, it should say "Tidal"
1. I use this one (Tidal) exclusively, because it matches organizational colors almost perfectly.
2. Click "Tidal"
1. The table appears over a blue background now.
2. Also, the boundaries for your table, as well as the handles that enable resizing it should also be more apparent.
1. This just makes everything a lot simpler.
3. In the top left of the screen,
1. Choose File
2. Choose Save

That is all we have for today.

Still hungry? 

If you really want to change the Theme to colors that better match your personality, repeat steps 1-3.

Should you choose one with a white background, I highly recommend adjusting the background color, so you see visual boundaries better.  You can always change it back to white later.

1. To change your background ...
1. Click on the background of your report so that you have NO visualization selected
1. How do I know that I have NO visualization selected?
1. The Visualizations pane will only have 2 icons at the top
2. At the top of the Visualizations pane,
1. Click the "Format your report page" icon (looks like a paper and paintbrush)
2. Select "Wallpaper"
1. Ensure the box for "Image" says "Browse"
1. If it does not, click the "X"
3. Choose a color from the color pallet
3. File > Save

Yes, you can use a picture for a background instead, if you really want to.

You probably noticed that there are two similar choices in there for backgrounds.

"Canvas Background" is the area within the report page. The boundaries of that are the dashed line going around the report screen.  You cannot move your visuals past that line.  That is the "Canvas."  You may have to adjust the transparency on this to see it happen.

"Wallpaper" refers to the area outside the report canvas.

Looking at how I have been doing this for the last bunch of years, it seems that I only use the Wallpaper with the Canvas background Transparency set to 100%.

Why?

I don't know.  The dashed line surrounding the Canvas is good enough for me to know where my layout space ends.

Until next time, play around with it and see what works best for you.

Power BI Report Date Display - Snack 7

It is time for another Snack!  Let's get back to that data we loaded several weeks ago.

Go to Power BI Service online, access "My Workspace," and click on the name of the report we are working on.  

If you are using the same sample data that I am, it is probably called "FinancialSample" or whatever you named it.  The type is a "Report."

It looks like a plain old ordinary table, right now.  It is nothing exciting, so we should start forming into something that is.

If you only added the date column last time, go ahead and add more.

The last time we were here, I added the following:

• Date
• Sales
• COGS
• Country
• Discount Band
• Gross Sales
• Manufacturing Price
• Product
• Profit
• Sale Price
• Units Sold

Viewing these, some of the column names may include "Sum of ..."

This is all OK.

Also, remember the Date is going to appear divided out by Year, Quarter, Month, and Day.

Today, we are going to fix that!

1. Click the EDIT button at the top of the page.
1. You should three panels appear on the right. 
   (One or more might be collapsed.  Don't worry about that too much.)
1. Filters
2. Visualizations
3. Data
2. Click on the data table on the screen so that the table visualization is selected.
3. Under the Visualizations panel, find the column that shows,
1. Date
1. Year
2. Quarter
3. Month
4. Day
2. Click the itty-bitty down arrow to the right of where it says "Date"
1. A menu appears that shows the following (or more items),
1. Remove field 
2. Move >
3. Show items with no data
4. Date
5. ✓ Date Hierarchy
3. Click the one that says Date
1. The data table should change to display something like "Friday, July 25, 2025" instead of all of those extra columns.
1. While that is pretty, it is not really want we want for this.  An adjustment to the Semantic Model is needed to get it to look the way we really want it.
4. Choose File from the top left
5. Choose Save
4. At the top of the screen, click "Open Data Model"
1. A new tab opens, related to your Data Model aka Semantic Model
2. Click the "Viewing" button in the top right
3. Choose "Editing"
4. In the Data panel,
1. Expand your data (click the little > next to "financials"
2. Click "Date"
5. In the Properties panel,
1. Choose "Date time format"
2. Choose "*3/14/2001 (m/d/yyyy)"
6. Close this tab (changes save automatically)
5. Back in your original tab, you may need to reload your window to the see changes.
1. The date column should display all dates in a format that looks like 7/25/2025
6. Choose File
7. Choose Save

We are with this for today.  I know it seems like a lot now, but most of these things will never need touched in this report again.  Power BI will remember everything we did.

Power BI Report Data Refresh - Snack 6

Now that we have everything relatively stable, and before we get to far into it, let's take a moment to consider how we might keep this updated.

This can be done easily, if you are getting data from a source that is consistent in format, meaning it looks exactly the same every time but with new numbers.

This can be done with very little effort and without having to go through the previously discussed process every single time.

Let's go over a couple of facts.

• The data set is in "My Workspace" in the Power BI Service.  
• It is named "Financial%20Sample," if you are using the same dataset that I am.
• The data (aka your spreadsheet) is still stored in OneDrive.
• It is named "Financial Sample.xlsx" if you are using the same file I am.
• I can't tell you where you stored it though.  You need to know that.

That file can be overwritten new data any time and update your Power BI Report with that new data.

There are a couple of conditions. 

• The file must be in the exact same structure every time.
• The file must use the same exact name.
• The original file must be overwritten with the new file.

Let's do it!

1. Get your new file, if you have one.
2. Ensure that file is exactly the same.
3. Ensure that file has the exact same name as the old one.
4. Copy that new file into the folder where you stored your original file.
1. A message will appear indicating "A file with this name already exists so we couldn't upload "Financial Sample.xlsx" Add it as a new version of the existing file or keep them both.
1. Choose "REPLACE"
5. Go to the Power BI service online
6. Go to "My Workspace"
7. Locate your "Semantic Model" (refer to type to discern the difference)
1. When you hover over your "Semantic Model," a circular arrow appears.
1. Hover over that circular arrow and it will say "Refresh"
2. Click that arrow to refresh your data
1. To the right of the "Refreshed" date stamp, you will see some dots chasing each other.   
2. When they stop chasing each other, the report has read your update.
8. Go look at your report.
1. If you have had it open, reload the page and your report now has new data.

Of interest:  If your department has a defined Workspace, you can do all this work there, then go into the settings for that Semantic Model and schedule a refresh, so you do not have to do steps 5-7

Power BI Snacks Intermission

In case you missed it, we have been walking through how to get yourself going with Power BI Online through little snack size posts over on Viva Engage and Teams.

We learned some terms, grabbed some data, imported it, and created our first simple visual.

There are definitely more exciting things to come!

It seems everyone was out for a super-fabulous holiday weekend, so I thought I might just do a quick recap this week.  Use this opportunity to explore what we have done already, simply catch up, work on your tan, or all of the above.

Below are links to what has been covered so far, to help you in those efforts ... sunscreen not included.

• Power BI DIY Snacks! Starting off with Power BI Online - Snack 1
• Power BI Terms - Snack 2
• Power BI Side Bar - Snack 3
• Power BI Report Data Import - Snack 4
• Power BI Report Simple Table Visual - Snack 5

See you for the next round?

As an interesting side note, I only just now discovered Mina Saad over on LinkedIn wrote along similar lines about a year ago.  Super informative posts on the topic and even tinier bites.  That's where I hijacked this week's image.

Power BI Report Data Display - Snack 5

Slightly funny story.  Someone contacted me last week and said they can't see anything in their report.  

We only imported the data last time.  

Now, we will visualize it and this won't take any time at all.

Head back over to the Power BI service online and let us see what we can see.

1. Click "Workspaces"
2. Click "My workspace"
1. At least two things are listed and for me, those are:
1. Financial%20Sample
1. Type = Semantic Model
1. This is the data!
2. FinancialSample
1. Type = Report
1. This is the report you created based on that data.
3. Open the one where Type = Report
1. A blank screen appears!!
4. Click "Edit"
5. In the right sidebar is the imported dataset
1. For me, it is simply named "financials"
1. Yours might be "Report-Result1" or "Worksheet" or "Sheet1" or whatever the Excel worksheet was named.
2. Click the little " > " next to the dataset name
1. A list of all the columns that were in the spreadsheet appear.
6. Under "Visualizations" in the right sidebar,
1. Click the little button that looks like a table.
1. That is the one that has a white grid, not the one that is partially blue.
1. See the attached screenshot that has a little red box around this feature.
2. On the left of the screen, a box appears that says "Select or drag fields ..."
7. Under "Data" in the right sidebar, quite literally do what that box says to do.
1. Use the check boxes that appear there or click on those column names and drag them over into the box on the left of the screen.
1. Make absolutely certain one of the columns is a date.
1. Add them all if you like, or just the ones you have a greater appreciation for.
2. If another box appeared when you went through this, that is ok.
1. For the empty one you would like to get rid of ...
1. Hover over the box and a little menu will appear above it.
1. Click the " . . . "
2. Choose "Remove"
8. File > Save

Your screen should look somewhat similar to the screenshot.  That with your data box has handles you can grab and stretch it out to see more of your data.

You might have noticed that the date looks kind of funny too.

This is what is called a hierarchal view.  

Power BI always displays dates in that format by default. 

We will get that fixed next time.

Questions? As always, post them up below.

Power BI Report Data Import - Snack 4

Enough fooling around, let's get down to making a basic Power BI Report.

You will need a properly formatted Excel file of your data.

If you are not sure of what that is, take a look at this sample file. Even if you think you are sure, take a look at the sample file anyway.

What do I mean by properly formatted?

Named Columns and their data ONLY.

If you have totals at the bottom, or special calculations off to the side or pretty colors representing something only known to you, none of that is going to work.

Named Columns with data. Period.

Make sure it is all in one worksheet too.

The Instructions Below (using that sample file)

In OneDrive

1. Create a New Folder
1. I called mine "Power BI Data"
2. You will use this to store all of your data for Power BI there.
2. Copy your Excel file in that folder

In Power BI,

1. Click "New Report"
2. Choose "Excel"
3. Window appears -> Connect to data source
1. In some instances, you may need to "Create a new connection"
1. Do that now, if you are unable to access your OneDrive.
2. Browse to your Excel file
3. Select your Excel file
4. Click "Next"
5. Window Appears -> Choose Data
1. Select the worksheet that has the data you want
1. If the data is in two sheets, you will need to merge it into one.
2. Click "Create"
6. Window Appears > Loading your data
1. After it is done processing ...
1. If your screen looks like the screenshot below, you win this round!
1. Note:  The Data sidebar in the right panel must display the name of your data to win (in this case, financials - highlighted).  
1. Yours will not be highlighted.
7. Last Step - Save your work!
1. At the top left of the screen, choose File > Save
2. In the screen presented after that, click "My Workspace"
3. At the bottom "Enter a name for your r..."
4. Click Save

Snack time is over.

Oh!  

Wait!

That reminds me!

There are a few more terms to know, related to that screen shot.

• Build visuals with your data
• This is where the report building will happen.
• Filters Panel
• Filters applied to your data.
• Visualizations Panel (there are 2 hidden beneath icons)
• Choose which visualizations to use and customize them.
• Data Panel
• The data associated with this particular report.