1. Welcome to Power BI Service
Now, let’s move on to Power BI Service. When a user logs into Power BI Service, they will be met with this page.
The page loads by default in the Home tab of your login access. On the left side of the screen, you can see that the Home tab is highlighted as this is our current view. The Home view usually shows recent files that you have accessed, as well as recommendations for reports and dashboards to be built.
We will now examine the Get data section.
Here, we are able to upload datasets to Power BI Service using files. If a different data source is required, it has to be connected to Power BI Desktop and then published to the Service for a connection to be created. Once we have uploaded or created connections to data sources, we can see these connections by clicking on the Datasets view.
Here we can see some connections that have already been made to datasets by the user. In Power BI Service, a dataset is distinguished by the orange label shown on the left of the dataset name. Let's explore this section a bit more. When hovering over a dataset name, we can see the three vertical dots appear - meaning there are more options available.
From the menu that appears, we will examine the settings option further. When clicking on this, we are taken to the settings of the dataset that has already been created. Here we can see information related to the gateway connection that has been set up in order for the dataset to be connected to the Power BI service. This requires login details associated with the database you are connecting to. In addition, we also see the option to create Scheduled Refreshes. Here a user can schedule automatic refreshes of the dataset so that it is up to date for use in reports and dashboards.
If we exit the settings page and go back to Datasets, we can see more information listed. There is the owner of the dataset shown, the date that the dataset was last refreshed, and the Workspace location of the dataset.
Workspaces are another important aspect of Power BI Service, as they help us to organize datasets, reports, and dashboards within our Power BI Service access. Towards the bottom of the left-hand menu, we can see two labels - Workspaces and My workspace. The bottom label shows the Workspace we are currently working in. If we click on the My workspace label, it will show us all the files stored in this work area.
If we now click on Workspaces, a new pop-up appears next to the left-hand menu. Here we can see a list of other workspaces that we have created or have access to. At the bottom of the pop-up, we can create new workspaces. My workspace is the area of Power BI Service that gives the user their own individual working and storage area. The other workspaces we create can be shared with other members of our organization, to who we can provide access so that datasets, reports, and dashboards can be viewed by complete teams.
Let’s view how a Workspace within an enterprise might appear. From the Workspaces created, let’s look at the company Adventure Works DW. If we enter the shared Workspace area, we can see several reports, datasets, and even dashboards that have been created.
Let’s click on the dashboard, which is recognizable by this green icon next to the dashboard name. We can see different visualizations. If we click on one of them, it will take us to the report that was used to create the visualization. If we go back to the Workspace home section, we can click on the settings option here to see who has access to this workspace and what type of access they have. As the administrator of the Workspace, we can change access types and even add new people from our organization.
Now that we have had a tour of the main features of the Power BI Service, it is time for some exercises!
2. Let's practice!