5 Detect Column Types Option ‘On Demand’ column type detection (previously only when first loaded data) Available on Transform tab PBI Desktop will detect which column type is now best for the columns selected Sep-2015 6 Refresh All Preview Refresh All Query Editor previews with a single click Previously had to refresh each query individually Sep-2015 7 Performance Improvements Choose columns dialog (Home tab) faster for wide table Filter and Items within a filter dropdown (e.g. list of products) will populate faster as well Much more fluent to work with query editor Sep-2015
popups faster for large numbers of values/fields 8 Filter by “Not Earliest/Latest Date” Also included in the “In the Next..” and “In the Previous” filter dialog Makes it easy to define dynamic rolling queries (last 7 days, ex) Oct-2015 9 Filter by “is in Previous N Select a Date Column in Query Editor Window Click dropdown Date/Time Filters In previous or In next options Oct-2015
12 Refresh Previews in Merge Queries Dialog Refreshing both tables in preview gives updated matches in join Oct-2015 13 Monospaced font for Query Editor Preview Easier to spot data cleanliness issues via preview (see additional characters or spaces) Oct-2015 14 Improved Function Invocation experience Easier to provide parameter values in navigator and preview when connecting to data sources Available for data sources that support functions Nov-2015 15 Option to set credentials at Server vs. Database level New radio button in credentials dialog prompt Nov-2015
16 Add Prefix/Suffix to a Text column Transform Tab Format Add Prefix or Also available in Add Column tab for creating a derived column with suffix or prefix Previously had to use a custom column and ampersand symbol Nov-2015 17 Append Multiple Tables Have always supported only two tables at a time and had to create multiple queries to support many source tables Can also append multiple copies of an existing table 18 “Refresh Data” for individual tables from Field List (Report and Data Views) Previously had to click Refresh from Home Tab and this would refresh all queries in the model Option also exists from dialog in Data View with Table selected
19 Option to Disable Data Previews to download in background Some data previews could be consuming CPU on machine File scoped option; only applied to given PBIX file (not a Global Option) File – Options and Settings - 20 Alphabetic sort of columns in Choose Columns dialog By default choose columns will show natural order of columns but now you can sort the columns displayed alphabetically Feb-2016 21 Improved performance Renaming columns is faster Removing colums is faster Reordering columns is faster These three operations now happen locally rather than sending queries to server for refreshing the preview This feature will be extended to other operations Feb-2016
More one click transforms to come.. 25 New Transforms Remove Blanks via Column Filter Convert duration to Years Keep Duplicates Remove all rows where value for current column is null or empty. Accessible via Column Filter menu dropdown Duration to Divide # of days of duration type column by 365 Available in Transfor or Add tab Keep duplicates – keep only rows with duplicated values on selected columns Available on Home tab under Remove Duplicates split button Mar-2016 26 Preview: whitespace and line feeds in Query Editor preview View tab – “Show whitespace” (now default) – in Query Editor Window Mar-2016 27 Option to disable preview from Navigator Reduces the # of calls being made to the data source to retrieve previews Mar-2016
28 Technical name support Can switch between ‘physical name’ (previous behavior) and ‘technical name’ (new behavior Mar-2016 29 Load: auto-step to disambiguate conflicting column names Power BI Desktop will automatically rename conflicting column names New steps in Query Editor that can be customized by user Mar-2016 30 Rename queries directly from queries pane Query Editor Select and the query to Rename Mar-2016 31 Smarsheet Connector now GA Automatic type detection of columns in sheets you import “changed type” step in Editor shows transforms applied Mar-2016
32 Query Parameters Create and manage parameters in Query Editor to make the PBI file dynamic Apply parameters to filter definitions for different columns Edit Parameters only allows you to edit the values of the parameters, not their definition. Access parameters from Query Editor (Edit Queries on Home tab) or from Home tab directly. From Query Editor: Apr-2016 33 Power BI Template files PBIT files ony contain the queries, visuals, formatting, model metadata, etc…not the data Can be used with parameters like an SSRS report – user accesses a template Main Menu – Export – Power BI Template Apr-2016 34 Conditional Columns GUI interface for creating conditional expressions and rules Can eliminate need for custom M expression Apr-2016
35 Column type indicator in Query Editor preview column headers Visual indicator distinguishes between Date/Time and Date, Decimal versus Whole Number, and more ABC, 123, 1.23, Date…easy visual indicator as opposed to seeing Data Type property Apr-2016 36 Reorder Queries and Query Groups via Drag & Drop gestures From Query Editor, can right-click to create group rolders and can drag-drop queries and parameters to folders Apr-2016 37 Query Mangement menu in the ribbon Can use Manage dropdown from Home tab rather than right-clicking an individual query Apr-2016 38 Text/CSV connector exposes editable settings in preview dialog Preview dialog allows user to configure File Origin, Delimiter, and Data Type Detection May-2016
43 Data picker support in Conditional Columns dialog May-2016 44 New context menu to create new queries from Queries Pane May-2016 45 Option to load or edit a template when importing template June-2016 46 Always allow parameterization View tab in Query Editor window Previously had to create a parameter beforehand June-2016
47 Create New parameter in context For common dialog boxes you may need/want to parameterize June-2016 48 Generate Query Steps in English File – Options – Global Option only shows up in non-English version of product June-2016 49 Description for query steps Previously it was possible to provide a description for queries but not steps of queries June-2016 50 Extract Week Day and Month Name from a DateTime column Available in both Transform and Add Column Per image, use the Date dropdown Date – Day – Weekday Date – Month – Month Name June-2016
51 Merge Date and Time columns into a DateTime column Select both columns and click “Combine Date and Time” Use Date or Time dropdown menu Available in Transform and Add Colum June-2016 52 Extract Start or End of an Hour based on a Date/Time or a Time column Use the Time dropdown Hour Available for both Transform and Add Column June-2016 53 Use R Scripts inside the Query Editor Use R script to perform cleansing, shaping, and analytics (predictions, clustering, etc) Need to have R installed locally Need to change privacy setting to public for source using R script Run R Script from the Transform tab in Query Editor July-2016
54 Query Parameters provided by output of other query Can now dynamically compute list of allowed values for a parameter (instead of static) Limitations: only queries that produce a List are supported In PBI Service, user doesn’t get list of values July-2016 55 Overwrite existing UDFs Background: can convert query to function (query parameters become function parameters) Can now overwrite functions when exporting multiple times from the same query July-2016 56 Merge or Append as New Query Merge or append operations are added as steps to existing query ‘as new’ creates new query (could also use Reference) Aug-2016