Book Image

Mastering Microsoft Power BI – Second Edition - Second Edition

By : Gregory Deckler, Brett Powell
4.5 (2)
Book Image

Mastering Microsoft Power BI – Second Edition - Second Edition

4.5 (2)
By: Gregory Deckler, Brett Powell

Overview of this book

Mastering Microsoft Power BI, Second Edition, provides an advanced understanding of Power BI to get the most out of your data and maximize business intelligence. This updated edition walks through each essential phase and component of Power BI, and explores the latest, most impactful Power BI features. Using best practices and working code examples, you will connect to data sources, shape and enhance source data, and develop analytical data models. You will also learn how to apply custom visuals, implement new DAX commands and paginated SSRS-style reports, manage application workspaces and metadata, and understand how content can be staged and securely distributed via Power BI apps. Furthermore, you will explore top report and interactive dashboard design practices using features such as bookmarks and the Power KPI visual, alongside the latest capabilities of Power BI mobile applications and self-service BI techniques. Additionally, important management and administration topics are covered, including application lifecycle management via Power BI pipelines, the on-premises data gateway, and Power BI Premium capacity. By the end of this Power BI book, you will be confident in creating sustainable and impactful charts, tables, reports, and dashboards with any kind of data using Microsoft Power BI.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
16
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17
Index

Creating Power Query M queries

As mentioned, the M language is a functional programming language that includes over 700 functions. Similar to other programming languages, M has its own specific syntax, structure, operators, and data types that must be used when coding. Experienced Power Query (M) developers, for example, are very familiar with Lists, Records, and Tables and common use cases and M functions available for working with these specific types.

While a full exploration of the entire M language is beyond the scope of this book, there are a number of important subjects regarding M that we cover in the following sections as well as providing readers with examples of more complex M queries. For readers interested in fully understanding the M language, we refer them to the official Power Query M language specification found here: https://bit.ly/3vmFSyr.

We’ll first take a look at numeric data types in M.

Numeric data types

For structured data sources, such...