In this blog post, we’ll dive into the fascinating world of Power BI and explore the newly introduced ‘Power BI Edit Model Feature.’ This feature has recently become a game-changer in the Power BI Service, offering a new level of accessibility and control. From its capabilities to its limitations, we’ll cover everything you need to know about this powerful tool to enhance your Power BI reports.
Unveiling the Power BI ‘Open data Model’ Feature
The ‘Open Model’ feature was rolled out in April and has rapidly gained interest within the Power BI community. Surprisingly, it didn’t come with the standard monthly feature update, hence the lack of widespread awareness.
But what exactly is this feature? In essence, the Edit Model feature allows you to make changes to your models within the Power BI service, eliminating the need to download the file and open it in Power BI desktop.
Historically, Power BI has allowed some editing within the service, but for substantial changes—like editing models, updating relationships, creating measures—you had to revert to the Power BI desktop. The introduction of this feature signifies a significant leap towards improving the efficiency of the Power BI service.
How to Edit Reports in Power BI Service
Once you own a report, an ‘edit’ button is available for you to modify your report pages, visuals, and access your data. However, previously, you couldn’t create new measures or interact with your data model as you would in the Power BI desktop.
The ‘Edit Models’ feature changes this by giving you the ‘Open Data Model’ option. Clicking this option opens up the model, allowing you to make changes directly within the Power BI service.
But before we get into the details, it’s essential to note that this feature is currently in preview and therefore turned off by default. You need to manually enable it.
How to Enable the Feature
Under your workspace, go to ‘Settings,’ then ‘Advanced options.’ Here, scroll down until you see ‘Data Model Settings.’ Check the box that says ‘Users can edit data models in the Power BI service’ and hit save. That’s it you’re ready to go.
You can open the data model in several ways. Apart from within the report, you can go to ‘More options’ under your data set or click ‘Open Data Model’ in the data set view.
Exploring the Feature: An Overview
The model view displays all tables within your model. Here, you can edit relationships and even create different layouts. However, these layouts are temporary they won’t be saved when you close the window.
Remember, any changes made to your model will automatically save, and there’s no undo button like in Power BI desktop, so tread carefully.
In the current view, you can’t preview the actual data view or the report view, as these are separate entities in the service. However, you can see all changes made in the report view when you open the edit on the other report instead of this data set.
On the right, you will find all your tables, measures, and calculations within your data model. You can create new calculations, measures, and columns and even view their DAX calculations.
There are a few limitations, though. You can only create DAX calculations you can’t create an empty table that isn’t DAX, for instance, for creating a measure table.
Moreover, be careful when creating new measures. The system won’t alert you about an error until you use the measure in the report view, unlike the Power BI desktop that validates your measures.
Limitations to Keep in Mind
The ‘Edit Model’ feature is still in its infancy, so some limitations should be expected. For instance, you can’t rename or delete columns or tables that aren’t created in DAX. You also can’t edit the data in your tables directly within the Power BI service. The ‘Edit Model’ feature doesn’t support DirectQuery or Live Connect models, and you can’t add or modify relationships or create new tables.
Lastly, the error-checking functionality is quite limited, particularly when creating DAX calculations. As mentioned earlier, Power BI service won’t notify you of any errors until you use the measure in the report view. This can be a bit tricky and requires attention to detail when creating new measures.
The Final Verdict
The introduction of the ‘Edit Model’ feature in Power BI service is an exciting development. It offers increased convenience and efficiency, making it easier than ever to edit your models without downloading the file and switching to the Power BI desktop.
While it has its limitations, we anticipate that future updates will address these issues and refine this feature. This is indeed a promising step towards making Power BI service a one-stop solution for data visualization and modeling.
That wraps up our overview of the ‘Edit Model’ feature. We hope this was helpful, and we look forward to sharing more updates and features with you in the future. As always, don’t hesitate to leave us a comment if you have any questions or suggestions!
So, keep experimenting with this new feature and feel free to share your experience and feedback!
You can visit the rest of our blog posts for more insightful information on everything related to Power BI.
Learn more about Power BI by taking our training course.
