Power BI as a Self-Service BI Platform:

Transcription

1 Power BI as a Self-Service BI Platform: Architecture, Use Cases, Strengths & Shortcomings SQL Saturday Atlanta 5/16/2015 Melissa Coates Solution Architect, BlueGranite Blog: sqlchick.com

2 Agenda: Power BI as a Self-Service BI Platform: Architecture, Use Cases, Strengths & Shortcomings 1. Overview and Evolution of Power BI 2. Demo of Power BI Preview 3. Power BI Architecture: Options, Strengths, Shortcomings 4. Use Cases for Fitting Into Data Delivery Platform 5. Recap + Questions Slides: Available at sqlchick.com under Presentations and Downloads

3 Overview & Evolution of Power BI

4 Components of Power BI Set of tools targeted primarily at analysts & power users to facilitate acquiring, cleansing, standardizing, modeling, presenting & sharing of data Power BI Designer Reports, Dashboards, Sharing, Q&A Mobile App Power Query Power Pivot Power View, Power Map, Excel PivotTable, Excel PivotChart Power BI Site Excel

5 Typical Users of Microsoft Reporting Tools Reporting Services Datazen PerformancePoint Visio Services Power BI Designer Power Pivot Power Query Power Map Report Builder Power View Excel Corporate BI Self-Service BI

6 Evolution of Power BI V1: Power BI for Office 365 Generally available Feb 2014 Excel Add-Ins Integrated with Office SharePoint Online Data must be replicated in Excel Data Model (Power Pivot) Will be retired; customers will migrate to new Power BI service Scope: Self-Service BI V2: Power BI Dashboards Public Preview Dec 2014 Excel Add-Ins or Power BI Designer Independent Software as a Service Support for Excel Data Model + Additional Data Sources, SaaS Connectors, and APIs Not yet generally available; evolving to reach parity + new features Scope: Self-Service BI + elements of Corporate BI/Analytics

7 Demo of Power BI Preview

8 Demo of Power BI Preview Report Consumer Experience: Power BI Site ios app Windows app Report Author Experience: Power BI Site Excel Add-Ins Power BI Designer Data Modeler Experience: Excel Add-Ins Power BI Designer

9 Architecture: Options, Strengths, Shortcomings

10 Ways to Utilize Power BI Components On-Premises Cloud Services 1 2 Excel Add-Ins (Only) Power Pivot for SharePoint #3 will be retired. Customers will migrate from #3 to # Power BI for Office 365 (V1) Power BI Dashboards (V2) Hybrid Environment Public Preview

11 1 Excel Add-Ins Only

12 2 Power Pivot for SharePoint Not fully supported in SharePoint 2013

13 3 Power BI for Office 365 Not available in Power BI for O365

14 4 New Power BI Dashboards Public Preview Not available outside of Excel Still reaching feature parity in the Power BI Preview

15 Summary: Strengths & Shortcomings Complexity Level Cost Data Capacity Limits Sharing Ability Excel Add-Ins Simplest option (though most limiting) Least expensive option Power Pivot for SharePoint Sizeable setup of SharePoint services More expensive (many features & services) Power BI Dashboards Not complex (can be integrated with A/D if desired) Free: $- Pro: $10/user/mo None None Free: 1GB/user/mo Pro: 10 GB/user/mo Limited (usually file share or 3 rd party app) Specialized Power Pivot for SharePoint document library Power BI Dashboards + Mobile App

16 Summary: Strengths & Shortcomings Scheduled Refresh (Automated) Workbook As a Data Source (Reusable Model) Row-Level Security for Report Consumers Excel Add-Ins Not natively (3 rd party apps) Power Pivot for SharePoint Yes No Yes Yes No (file level security) Yes (if accessing data source directly rather than thru Power Pivot) Power BI Dashboards Yes (can t control all settings though) Yes (*) (if accessing data source directly rather than thru Power Pivot) *Currently limited to original author only; doesn t extend to shared recipient

17 Summary: Strengths & Shortcomings Release Cadence of New Features Mobile App Available Q&A Natural Language Available Data Alerting Capability Excel Add-Ins Slower (Excel release cycle) No Power Pivot for SharePoint Slower (Excel & SharePoint release cycles) No (Power Pivot not yet supported by Datazen) Power BI Dashboards Faster (if Power BI Designer is used vs. Excel for authoring) Yes (iphone, ipad, Windows tablet) No No Yes (certain data sources) No Yes (SSRS integrated mode) Yes (iphone mobile app)

18 Summary: Strengths & Shortcomings Power Query Supported System Administrator Insight Max Workbook Size HTML5 for Data Presentation Export Ability Excel Add-Ins Power Pivot for SharePoint Yes No Yes Limited None (Limited only by PC specs) No (Silverlight) Standard Excel (Power View page to single PDF file) Yes (Management Dashboard) 2GB No (Silverlight) Standard Excel; Power View to Power Point Power BI Dashboards None yet 250MB Yes None yet

19 Use Cases for Fitting into a Data Delivery Platform

20 Bimodal BI & Analytics Two modes for development & delivery of information Agile Self-Service BI Business-driven Rapid delivery Less governance Exploration freedom Traditional Corporate BI Defined IT-driven processes Reliable Governed & secured Standardized

21 Bimodal BI: Where Power BI Can Fit Self-Service BI Corporate BI Excel Data Model (Power Pivot) Upsize Prototype SSAS Tabular Model Mashup of different data sources One-time or infrequent analysis Supply info needed very fast Augment corporate BI solutions Standalone SaaS Connectors (ex: SalesForce, CRM) Application Integration (APIs) DW & Analytics Environment Analytical Azure ML Data Warehouse HD Insight Power BI Visualizations Data Lake Stream Analytics

22 Use Cases for Power BI Power BI used for data shaping, modeling, and reporting (data typically is replicated & refreshed in Power BI) Power BI used for reporting only (data queries only; not replicated in Power BI) Query Model Report Small individual self-service projects Data mashups (up to 250MB compressed in web) One-time or infrequent analysis On the fly reporting with Q&A (ex: customer acct review) Standalone SaaS connectors APIs to programmatically push data to Power BI Report Interactive reports are desired (as opposed to pixel perfect ) Integration with Azure Services Reports from source w/ higher data volumes Reports from source w/ row level security (*) SSAS Connector *Currently limited to original author only; doesn t extend to shared recipient

23 Recap + Questions

24 Recap of Main Points Power BI is continually evolving and growing in its role as a selfservice BI tool, as well as elements of corporate BI A hybrid approach can be utilized to take advantage of existing BI/DW assets Various options, each with its own strengths and shortcomings, will remain as viable choices for delivery: Excel (Add-Ins Only) Power Pivot for SharePoint (On-Premises) Power BI (SaaS) Migrations from Power BI for O365 Coming at a later date: Integration within applications A purposeful Bimodal BI approach can attempt to balance many different agile and traditional needs

25 Thanks, Thanks, Thanks for Attending! Melissa Coates Blog: sqlchick.com Check Presentations & Downloads at sqlchick.com for this slide deck. Creative Commons License: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivative Works 3.0