MS Power BI July 2024 Update

In the rapidly growing field of data analytics, staying competitive means utilizing cutting-edge tools and features. Microsoft’s Power BI continues to lead this transformation, consistently upgrading its offerings to deliver more profound insights and robust data visualizations. The July 2024 update brings a host of new features and enhancements aimed at empowering both data professionals and business users.

In this month's update of Power BI, the area of main focus were Reporting, Modeling, Service, Report Server and Visualizations as always. In this month's update there are some new features added for developers as well.

Some of the glimpse of July 2024 Update, can be seen in this article.

1.??Reporting: Enhanced Customization for Azure Maps Visual in Power BI; The July 2024 Power BI update enhances the Azure Maps visual with new features, including CSV file support for reference layers, in-app customization of layer shapes, and dynamic URL support through conditional formatting. These improvements simplify the customization process and enable more interactive visualizations.

2. Modeling:

?????????????I.?New Enhanced Row-Level Security Editor Now Available in Power Bl Desktop; Power BI Desktop's new row-level security editor is now available, allowing users to easily create and edit security roles and filters without writing DAX. Access the editor via 'Manage roles' from the ribbon. Users can switch between a user-friendly drop-down interface and a rich DAX editor with autocomplete and validation features. Changes persist across both interfaces, providing flexibility in creating security roles.

????????????II.?DAX Query View Now Available in Live Connect; We can now use DAX query view in Power BI Desktop while live connected to a published semantic model. This lets us write DAX queries directly, view data without creating visuals, and use quick queries for instant DAX generation from tables, columns, or measures. It's designed to enhance analysis beyond report authoring, even with models managed by others.

???????????III.?Add or update multiple measures in DAX query view; In DAX query view, we can now easily add or update multiple measures using the DEFINE syntax. This feature simplifies authoring DAX formulas and allows us to define many measures at once, to our model with just a single click, streamlining the process of managing and formatting DAX queries.

3.??Data Connectivity: Some new & updated certified connectors have also been added to Power BI to easily able to work with any data source.

·???New Connectors are; Windsor and BuildingConnected

·???Updated Connectors are; SingleStore and Smartsheet

4.??Service: Simplified PowerPoint Export Options for Enhanced Clarity; Export to PowerPoint options have been simplified into a single dialog, allowing users to choose between embedding live data via Power BI add-in or exporting the report as images.

5.??For Developers:

????????????I. Update for field parameter feature for custom visuals; The new feature, sourceFieldParameters is a new property in DataViewMetadataColumn that identifies whether a query field results from a field parameter resolution. If a field can originate from multiple field parameters, this property will list all associated field parameters. This update is available in API v5.10.0.

???????????II.??Update in Power BI enhanced report format (PBIR); Limitations in the previous updates has been resolved now and now we can export .pptx or pdf for the .pbir file format. Apart from this now we can also include it to subscriptions as well. But there are still some limitations such as, Mobile Layouts aren’t applied and it can’t be utilized in Power BI Embedded.

6.??Visualizations: ?

???????? I.??Some new visuals have been added in the AppSource. These are; Icon Map Pro, StackedTrends Visual, Smart Grid-Map, Multilevel Matrix Xerppa, Sankey Diagram, Waffle Chart Maker, Waterfall Chart, SPC Visual.

??????????II.?Linear Gauge by Powerviz: Powerviz Linear Gauge displays progress against targets on a linear scale. It features four-gauge styles (Linear, Bar in Bar, Cylinder, Thermometer), customizable templates, absolute/percentage scales, custom targets, 30+ color palettes, labels for readability, small multiples, and ranking filters for Top/Bottom N.

?????????III.?Drill Down Map PRO by ZoomCharts; The Drill Down Map PRO by ZoomCharts enhances Power BI map charts with node clustering, base layer customization (AzureMaps or custom tiles), up to 10 customizable shape layers, conditional formatting, paginated tooltips, custom tooltip fields, auras, node images, and a lasso tool.

???????IV.?Advanced Geospatial Analytics Made Simple with Icon Map Pro for Power BI; Icon Map Pro, an enhanced version of Icon Map, offers advanced geospatial visualization and analysis in Power BI. It features a simplified interface, catering to data analysts, GIS specialists, and BI professionals, enabling seamless integration of geographic insights into dashboards for improved decision-making.

7.? Paginated Reports:

???????????I.?Bind to Gateway API support for paginated reports; You can now bind your paginated reports to gateways with a REST API. This will allow paginated reports to connect to on-prem gateways without requiring users to go to the UI in the Power BI service and bind the report to the specified gateway.

?????????????II.?Parameters, Header/Footer and much more in the web authoring experience for paginated reports (Preview); The new web authoring experience for paginated reports introduces parameters, headers, footers, and page numbers. Users can add headers, footers, textboxes, images, and create parameters directly in the web interface. Changes in the "Editor" reflect in the "Preview" with sample data. This update, rolling out soon, allows report sharing with defined parameters. It's currently a preview feature and not yet available on Sovereign clouds.

8.? Power BI Report Server: Power BI Report Server is now included with F64+ Reserved Instance purchases. It continues to be available with SQL Server Enterprise core licenses with software assurance. You can get the PBIRS key in the “Fabric Capacity” tab under “Capacity Settings” in the admin portal.

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