Basics of Version Control

1. Basics of Version Control

In this video, we will look at version control in Fabric and how it can help you organize your workspace and avoid common pitfalls when working with files, such as Power BI reports, that are constantly evolving to meet business needs.

2. Version Control at Fashionbric...

When looking at the Fashionbric Fabric workspace, you see many reports with names like "Report V1," "Report V2," and so on. This is actually the first stage of a rudimental version control. If there's a mistake or something has changed, you can open an older version to compare or modify it.

3. Version Control in Fabric!

As you might expect, this particular system doesn't scale well in large workspaces. What happens if you have hundreds of reports and thousands of changes? How do you organize all these versions? That's why more advanced version control systems are used in Fabric.

4. Version Control, in brief

A proper version control system works like a Time Machine for your projects. It lets you travel back to previous moments so you can revisit earlier versions of your files. Each change you make is saved as a snapshot, so you can easily revert to a previous state if needed. You can also compare any snapshot with ease to see what has changed between versions.

5. Types of Version Control

There are many version control systems, but in this lesson, we'll focus on Git. Why Git? Well, it's not only the most popular version control system, but it's also the one supported by Fabric.

6. Version Control terminology

Let's look at some common version control terms. A repository is a folder that is tracked by the version control system and stores all the code and files you are using. A commit is a snapshot. It saves the current state of your project with a message explaining the changes.

7. Version Control terminology

A diff shows the differences between two versions of files, highlighting modifications. In this example, additions are in green, subtractions are in red

8. Version Control terminology

Finally, a merge combines changes from different versions into one, allowing seamless integration of contributions while resolving any conflicts.

9. Challenges of Version Control in Fabric

While you can place any file under version control, binary files come with notable limitations. These non-textual files, like ZIPs, images, videos, and PBIX files, are often compressed for better performance. Although you can restore previous versions of these files, the diff function won't work, making it hard to see what has changed.

10. Let's practice!

Now that you know the basics of Version Control, let's do some exercises.

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