What is Power BI? Architecture, Components and Features Explained
What is Power BI?
Power BI is a business analytics service provided by Microsoft. It enables you to visualize your data. It allows you to share insights. It transforms data from various sources to create interactive dashboards and Business Intelligence reports. For example, with sales data in an Excel sheet, Power BI helps you build different charts and graphs to visualize the data.
Why Power BI?
Here are the reasons why Power BI is highly popular and essential in the BI domain:
Access to Volumes of Data from Multiple Sources
Power BI can access vast volumes of data from multiple sources, enabling you to view, analyze, and visualize large datasets that cannot be opened in Excel. Some of the important data sources include Excel, CSV, XML, JSON, PDF, etc. Power BI uses powerful compression algorithms to import and cache the data within the .PBIX file.
Interactive UI/UX Features
Power BI offers visually appealing features with an easy drag-and-drop functionality, allowing you to copy all formatting across similar visualizations.
Exceptional Excel Integration
Power BI facilitates the gathering, analyzing, publishing, and sharing of Excel business data. Anyone familiar with Office 365 can easily connect Excel queries, data models, and reports to Power BI Dashboards.
Accelerate Big Data Preparation with Azure
Using Power BI with Azure enables the analysis and sharing of massive volumes of data. An Azure data lake can reduce the time it takes to gain insights and increase collaboration among business analysts, data engineers, and data scientists.
Turn Insights into Action
Power BI enables you to gain insights from data. You can turn insights into actions for making data-driven business decisions.
Real-time Stream Analytics
Power BI enables real-time stream analytics. It allows you to fetch data from multiple sensors and social media sources for real time analytics. You are always prepared. Ready to make business decisions.
Advantages of Power BI
User-friendly Interface: Power BI has intuitive interface. This makes it easy for users to visualize data. It also facilitates the analysis.
Data Integration: Power BI allows users to integrate data from various sources. This includes Excel SQL Server and cloud-based sources like Azure and Salesforce.
Customizable Dashboards: Users can create customized dashboards and reports. These tools display data meaningfully.
Real-time Data: Power BI supports real-time data processing. Users can view up-to-date data in their dashboards. They can also view reports.
Collaboration: Power BI allows users to share their dashboards and reports. It makes collaboration on data analysis projects easier.
Disadvantages of Power BI
Limited Data Processing Capabilities: Power BI may struggle with large datasets. It also can struggle to handle complex queries as it is not designed for heavy-duty data processing.
Limited Customization Options: While Power BI offers range of customization options. Users may find limitations in creating truly unique visualizations. They may also encounter restrictions when making comprehensive reports.
Cost: Power BI is not free tool. Users may need to pay for additional features or storage space.
Power BI Architecture
Power BI architecture is built on top of Azure. Power BI can connect to multiple data sources. Power BI Desktop allows you to create reports. It enables data visualizations on the dataset. The Power BI gateway connects to on-premise data sources. This provides continuous data for reporting and analytics. The Power BI services refer to cloud services. These are used to publish Power BI reports and data visualizations. With Power BI mobile apps, you can stay connected to your data from anywhere. Apps are available for Windows, iOS. Android platforms.
Power BI Service
Power BI service also known as Power BI Online, is the Software as Service (SaaS) component of Power BI. You must log in to Power BI service. It allows you to connect to data. Create reports and dashboards. Ask questions about your data.
Power BI Dashboard
A Power BI Dashboard is a single-page visualization that tells a story. The visualizations on a dashboard are generated from reports. Each report is based on one dataset. A single-page dashboard is known as a Canvas. Visualizations on the dashboard, called Tiles, are pinned by report designers.
Components of Power BI
· Power Query
Power Query is a data transformation and mash-up engine. It allows you discover connect, combine and refine data sources to meet your analysis needs. It can be downloaded as an add-in for Excel. Alternatively, it can be used as part of Power BI Desktop.
· Power Pivot
Power Pivot is data modeling technique that allows you to create data models. You can establish relationships and create calculations using the Data Analysis Expression (DAX) language. This enables you to model simple. It also allows you to model complex data.
· Power View
Power View is available in Excel. SharePoint SQL Server and Power BI. It lets you create interactive charts, graphs maps and other visuals. It brings your data to life. It can connect to data sources and filter data for each data visualization element or the entire report.
· Power Map
Power Map for Excel and Power BI is a 3-D data visualization tool that lets you map your data and plot more than a million rows of data visually on Bing maps in 3-D format from an Excel table or Data Model in Excel.
· Power BI Desktop
Power BI Desktop is a development tool for Power Query. It is also used for Power Pivot and Power View providing comprehensive solution for developing BI. The tool facilitates data analysis experiences.
· Power Q&A
The Q&A feature in Power BI allows you to explore data in natural language. This lets you get answers quickly from the data. You can ask questions like “What was the total sales last year”
Features of Power BI
1. Power BI Desktop
Power BI Desktop is free software that you can download and install, allowing you to build reports by accessing data easily without advanced report designing or query skills.
2. Stream Analytics
Power BI’s support for stream analytics allows for real-time analysis from various sources, enabling timely decision-making.
3. Multiple Data Sources
Power BI supports various data sources such as Excel, CSV, SQL Server, Web files, etc., enabling the creation of interactive visualizations.
4. Custom Visualization
Power BI provides access to a custom library of visualizations to meet your needs when dealing with complex data.
Power BI Career Opportunities
Power BI skills are highly sought after in the business intelligence and analytics field. Career opportunities include business intelligence analyst, data analyst, A data scientist, and business intelligence developer.
Power BI Certifications
Several Power BI certifications are available. This includes the Microsoft Certified Data Analyst Associate certification. It covers skills related to data analysis, data visualization and data modeling using Power BI.
Power BI Analyst Salary
According to Glassdoor average salary for a Power BI analyst in the United States is around $88,000 per year.
Versions of Power BI
Power BI is available in several versions. These include Power BI Desktop Power BI Pro, Power BI Premium and Power BI Mobile. Each offering different features and capabilities for data analysis and visualization.
Who Uses Power BI Applications?
Power BI is used by various industries and organizations including healthcare, finance retail and manufacturing. Users include business analysts. Data analysts. Data scientists and other professionals who need to analyze and visualize data.
Conclusion
Power BI is powerful tool that transforms your raw data into meaningful insights. It helps businesses make data-driven decisions. This happens with ease. Its ability to integrate data from multiple sources is impressive. It offers real-time stream analytics. The user-friendly interface makes it an indispensable asset in today’s data-driven world.
For those seeking professional assistance with Power BI, Etelligens Technologies stands out as leading Power BI consulting company. Etelligens Technologies specializes in providing tailored Power BI solutions. It helps businesses leverage their data effectively. With a team of experienced professionals, they offer services ranging from data integration to dashboard creation. They also provide advanced analytics and real-time reporting.
