Overview of Power BI: What is Power BI?

Power BI is a business intelligence and analytics solution that enables powerful, interactive, visual reports and workspaces using SaaS * technology developed by Microsoft.

*Software as a Service – A cloud application that allows users to connect to and use cloud-based applications over the Internet.

What is Power BI?

Why Use Power BI as a Business Intelligence Solution?

The data obtained from various sources of organizations is increasing day by day. Power BI is a solution that can be easily used by business analysts and senior executives with its simple and user-friendly interface, which makes the stored data read and understandable by merging and restructuring.

In addition, Power BI is strong and mature enough to be used by Business Intelligence Specialists in enterprise systems.

One of the most important advantages of being developed by Microsoft is its integration with other Microsoft products.

For example : You can share a report in SharePoint that you created in Power BI. SharePoint can provide users with the authorization you have made in the environment. You can also get your data from Excel or MS SQL Server to Power BI and make your data more meaningful by using the dozens of visualizations available in Power BI.

Click here to view the article titled Get Data From SQL Server.

Click here to view the article titled Get Data From Excel.

Components of Power BI

Power BI consists of 6 components in general and can be used separately on the marketplace.

1)Power Query: 

It is generally a Business Intelligence (BI) tool that allows you to import and edit data from different sources. It is installed as an add-on to Excel.

In Power BI Desktop, the equivalent section is Edit Queries. Edit Queries section describes how some operations are performed on the data (binding, joining, merging filtering, analyzing, etc.) It is Power BI’s data link technology.

Power BI Desktop – Edit Queries | Components of Power BI | What is Power BI?

2) Power Pivot:

A data modeling technology that allows you to create data models, build relationships, and also perform calculations. With Power Pivot, you can work with large high-performance data sets, build comprehensive relationships, and create comprehensive (or simple) calculations.

Power BI is a structure that contains all the features mentioned above in the Power Pivot.

You can create Measure and Column by performing various calculations with DAX functions.

DAX Functions in Power BI | Components of Power BI

You can also create new data models in Power BI Relationships tab, that you make relations between the tables and make up the data.

Power BI Desktop – Power BI Relationships | Components of Power BI | What is Power BI?

3) Power View: 

It is the data visualization component of Power BI. It is used to interact with a raw data received by connecting to a data source.

Power View | Components of Power BI | What is Power BI?

4) Power Map:

It is a component created with Microsoft Bing Maps infrastructure and installed as Excel add-in. It allows you to visualize the country / region / province / district and coordinates data entered in Excel on maps in 3D.

With this feature integrated into Power BI, you can report some of your data on maps in a much more intuitive and analysable way.

Power Map | Components of Power BI

5) Power Q&A:

As its name indicates, it is the Question & Answer engine.

In Power BI, Q & A can produce very efficient reports.

As you can see in the screenshot below, this function was only possible on the Power BI Web. With the December 2017 update, it is now also available from Power BI Desktop.

Power Q&A | Components of Power BI

6) Power BI Desktop:

Power BI ‘ s user-friendly, powerful and constantly updated desktop development tool.

Power BI Desktop | Components of Power BI

Power BI

Power BI Desktop

Power Query, Power Pivot, Power View (Power Map is included in this combination) that combines all these solutions under a single user-friendly, powerful and constantly updated with updated desktop tool.

If you want to download the Power BI Desktop application free, you can click here.

Power BI Desktop | Power BI

Power BI Web :

It is the section where reports, analyzes, solutions in general are published and presented to the user. It is complementary to every data transaction performed in Power BI Desktop. To give an example, the user assignment of an authority role created in Power BI Desktop is performed in the Power BI Web part.

Generally used by end-users. Power BI Web section is available at https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/.

Power BI Web | Power BI

Power BI Web Visualizations | Power BI | What is Power BI?

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Thank you.