After using the brand-spanking-new Power BI Desktop for a couple of days, these are my favorite features so far, especially as compared to Power View and PowerPivot:
- Ease of navigation between data model and visualizations. No more switching between windows.
- One-click publishing to powerbi.com. It couldn’t be easier.
- The new visualization types and the potential market for third-party visualizations.
- The many (and growing) list of data sources.
- More control over chart customization (e.g., colors, titles, etc.). For many people this was a reason for looking at other products and a let down when compared with Excel charts.
- Seamless integration between data, data transformations, and data model. Again, no more switching between windows.
- The unity of interface between the Power BI Desktop and the report editor in powerbi.com.
- The placing of measures in the fields list of a table. I could never get my measures to look right at the bottom of the grid and was always playing with the column widths. Now measures are first-class citizens.
- The elimination of the colon for defining measures. Perhaps a minor detail, but syntax simplification and uniformity is always welcome.
- The ability to connect to and build reports from tabular models without having to import data. Another huge reason to not look at other products.
- The promise of frequent updates and improvements. This should keep the excitement going.
- The fact that the community’s input is actively being sought and paid attention to. It’s great when you submit a smile or a frown and you get a response for more information.
What’s still in Power View and PowerPivot that I soon wish to see in the Power BI Desktop, hopefully in an improved fashion:
- The play axis for scatter charts.
- More control over fonts.
- Hierarchies in the data model.
- KPIs
- Column filters in the data view.
- Default aggregations for fields.
- Synonyms for Q&A.
- Themes.
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