Categories
Excel Power BI Power Query

Which Power Query Functions exist in Power BI but not Excel?

The final number of missing identifiers*

The only function that Power BI is missing is Facebook.Graph (on my machine)

* This query checks for missing identifiers (which may be functions).
( You can filter by type if you convert #shared to a table instead of calling Record.FieldNames() )

Generating the list using #shared

To get a list of all identifiers (functions, variables, constants) I use the variable named #shared . Create a new blank query, then paste this 

let
    IdentifierList = List.Sort(Record.FieldNames( #shared ))
in
    IdentifierList

I copy using Copy Entire List, then storing the results into a PowerShell variable. I Repeat the same with Power BI.

That’s more than I expected.

To find out exactly which functions are different, use the Power Shell operator -NotIn

# Find functions in PBI but not Excel
$MissingExcel = $PowerBI | ? { $_  -notin $Excel }

# Find functions in Excel but not PBI
$MissingPowerBI = $Excel | ? { $_  -notin $PowerBI }

The list of functions Power BI is Missing

Facebook.Graph

The list of functions Excel is Missing

Note: This is the list for today, on my machine. Run the #shared query to find any changes.

AI.ExecuteInProc
AI.ExecuteInternal
AI.ExternalSort
AI.GetAutoMLEntity
AI.SampleStratifiedWithHoldout
AI.TestConnection
AIFunctions.Capacities
AIFunctions.Contents
AIFunctions.ExecuteInternal
AIFunctions.GetAutoMLEntity
AIFunctions.PostProcess
AIInsights.Contents
AIInsights.ContentsGenerator
AML.Execute
AML.ExecuteBatch
Acterys.Contents
Actian.Contents
AmazonRedshift.Database
Anaplan.Contents
ApacheHiveLLAP.Database
ApacheSpark.Tables
Asana.Tables
AtScale.Cubes
AutomationAnywhere.Feed
AzureCostManagement.Contents
AzureCostManagement.Tables
AzureDataExplorer.Contents
AzureDataExplorer.Databases
AzureDevOpsServer.AccountContents
AzureDevOpsServer.AnalyticsViews
AzureDevOpsServer.Feed
AzureDevOpsServer.Views
AzureEnterprise.Contents
AzureEnterprise.Tables
AzureHiveLLAP.Database
AzureMLFunctions.Contents
AzureMLFunctions.Execute
AzureMLFunctions.ExecuteBatch
AzureSpark.Tables
AzureTimeSeriesInsights.Contents
BI360.Contents
BIConnector.Contents
Binary.Range
Cdm.Contents
Cdm.MapToEntity
Cds.Contents
Cds.Entities
Cherwell.SavedSearches
Cognite.Contents
CommonDataService.Database
Compression.Brotli
Compression.LZ4
Compression.None
Compression.Snappy
Compression.Zstandard
CustomerInsights.Contents
DataVirtuality.Database
DataWorld.Contents
DataWorld.Dataset
Databricks.Contents
Denodo.Contents
DocumentDB.Contents
Dremio.Databases
Dynamics365BusinessCentral.Contents
Dynamics365BusinessCentral.EnvironmentContents
Dynamics365BusinessCentralOnPremises.Contents
DynamicsNav.Contents
Emigo.Contents
Emigo.GetExtractFunction
EmigoDataSourceConnector.GetExtractFunction
EmigoDataSourceConnector.NavigationFunctionType
EntersoftBusinessSuite.Contents
Essbase.Cubes
Exasol.Database
FactSetAnalytics.AuthenticationCheck
FactSetAnalytics.Functions
Fhir.Contents
Foundry.Contents
Geography.FromWellKnownText
Geography.ToWellKnownText
GeographyPoint.From
Geometry.FromWellKnownText
Geometry.ToWellKnownText
GeometryPoint.From
Github.Contents
Github.PagedTable
Github.Tables
GoogleAnalytics.Accounts
GoogleBigQuery.Database
Graph.Nodes
HexagonSmartApi.ApplySelectList
HexagonSmartApi.ApplyUnitsOfMeasure
HexagonSmartApi.ExecuteParametricFilterOnFilterRecord
HexagonSmartApi.ExecuteParametricFilterOnFilterUrl
HexagonSmartApi.Feed
HexagonSmartApi.GenerateParametricFilterByFilterSourceType
HexagonSmartApi.GetODataMetadata
HexagonSmartApi.Typecast
HiveProtocol.HTTP
HiveProtocol.Standard
HiveProtocol.Type
Html.Table
IRIS.Database
Impala.Database
Indexima.Database
IndustrialAppStore.NavigationTable
InformationGrid.Contents
Intune.Contents
JamfPro.Contents
JethroODBC.Database
Kyligence.Database
Linkar.Contents
LinkedIn.SalesContracts
LinkedIn.SalesContractsWithReportAccess
LinkedIn.SalesNavigator
LinkedIn.SalesNavigatorAnalytics
LinkedIn.SalesNavigatorAnalyticsImpl
List.ConformToPageReader
MailChimp.Collection
MailChimp.Instance
MailChimp.Tables
MailChimp.TablesV2
MariaDB.Contents
MarkLogicODBC.Contents
Marketo.Activities
Marketo.Leads
Marketo.Tables
MicroStrategyDataset.Contents
MicroStrategyDataset.TestConnection
MicrosoftAzureConsumptionInsights.Contents
MicrosoftAzureConsumptionInsights.Tables
MicrosoftAzureConsumptionInsights.Test
MicrosoftGraphSecurity.Contents
Mixpanel.Contents
Mixpanel.Export
Mixpanel.FunnelById
Mixpanel.FunnelByName
Mixpanel.Funnels
Mixpanel.Segmentation
Mixpanel.Tables
Netezza.Database
PQ_Hi_World.Contents
Parquet.Document
Paxata.Contents
Pdf.Tables
PlanviewEnterprise.CallQueryService
PlanviewEnterprise.Feed
PlanviewProjectplace.Contents
PowerBI.Dataflows
PowerPlatform.Dataflows
ProductInsights.Contents
ProductInsights.QueryMetric
Projectplace.Feed
Python.Execute
QubolePresto.Contents
QuickBase.Contents
QuickBooks.Query
QuickBooks.Report
QuickBooks.Tables
QuickBooksOnline.Tables
R.Execute
Roamler.Contents
ShortcutsBI.Contents
Siteimprove.Contents
Smartsheet.Content
Smartsheet.Query
Smartsheet.Tables
Snowflake.Databases
Spark.Tables
SparkPost.GetList
SparkPost.GetTable
SparkPost.NavTable
SparkProtocol.Azure
SparkProtocol.HTTP
SparkProtocol.Standard
SparkProtocol.Type
Spigit.Contents
StarburstPresto.Contents
Stripe.Contents
Stripe.Method
Stripe.Tables
SurveyMonkey.Contents
SweetIQ.Contents
SweetIQ.Tables
Table.AddFuzzyClusterColumn
Table.CombineColumnsToRecord
Table.ConformToPageReader
Table.FuzzyGroup
TeamDesk.Database
TeamDesk.Select
TeamDesk.SelectView
Tenforce.Contents
TibcoTdv.DataSource
TimeSeriesInsights.Contents
Troux.CustomFeed
Troux.Feed
Troux.TestConnection
Twilio.Contents
Twilio.Tables
Twilio.URL
VSTS.AccountContents
VSTS.AnalyticsViews
VSTS.Contents
VSTS.Feed
VSTS.Views
Value.Alternates
Value.Expression
Value.Lineage
Value.Optimize
Value.Traits
Vena.Contents
Vertica.Database
VesselInsight.Contents
Web.BrowserContents
Webtrends.KeyMetrics
Webtrends.Profile
Webtrends.ReportContents
Webtrends.Tables
WebtrendsAnalytics.Tables
Witivio.Contents
WorkforceDimensions.Contents
WorkplaceAnalytics.Data
Zendesk.Collection
Zendesk.Tables
Categories
Quick Tips Snippets SQL

Generating Random Numbers in SQL

To generate random integers from min to max, including min and max

SELECT FLOOR( RAND()*( Max - Min + 1 )) + Min;

Example: To create a random integer between 5 and 10

SELECT FLOOR( RAND()*( 10 - 5 + 1 )) + 5;
Categories
PowerShell References And Cheat Sheets

Learning PowerShell

Getting started with PowerShell

Main

Grammar

Important Topics, Language quirks

For( ;; ) vs ForEach vs ForEach-Object

It’s first argument is a ScriptBlock so it appears like a control loop.

Notice return verses break in ForEach-Object . Remember that the { ... stuff ... } in this case is an anonymous function , not a language control statement
It is a parameter to the ForEach-Object . When not specified, it’s the -Process Parameter

Flow Control with language Keywords

Attributes for validation

Best Practices

Naming

Categories
PowerShell Quick Tips Regex

Using Case-Sensitive Regular expressions in PowerShell – Tips

Find-Member using a case-insensitive Regex

Say you want to find functions that uses parameters named like:
-AsString, -AsHashTable, or -AsByteStream

Using Find-Member makes it easy.

> Find-Member -Name 'As*'

That’s close, but I want it to start with a capital letter, to skip matches like:
Assembly or Asin

Converting Like to a Regex

The -like pattern As* is the same as the regex ^As
To start with a capital letter you could use: ^As[A-Z]

Disabling Case-Sensitive matches

Because PowerShell defaults to case-insensitive matches
You need to remove the i insensitive flag using the syntax (?-i)

Solution

> Find-Member -Name '(?-i)^As[A-Z]' -RegularExpression

The final pattern is (?-i)^As[A-Z]
Making it case-sensitive narrowed down the matches from 113 to 43 !

See More

Categories
Power BI Quick Tips

Tip: Controlling a Column’s “Summarize By” Type in Power BI

The Model view allows you to set a global default “Summarize By” type for every column.
You still have the ability to override the aggregation type per-visual in Report view

Categories
Power BI Power Query References And Cheat Sheets What's New

Searching Constants Defined in Power Query

Searching Power Query Language Functions and Constants

Categories
Power BI What's New

Power BI Updates – 2020-08-17

Guy In a Cube: July roundup

He covers and links these topics:

Power BI – Introducing Sync Slicers

PBI Patch Notes Summary

Power BI Desktop July 2020 feature summary

External tools

Tabular Editor

https://tabulareditor.com/

Dax Studio

https://daxstudio.org/

ALM Toolkit

ALM Toolkit

sqlbi.com/alm-toolkit

Categories
Power BI Power Query References And Cheat Sheets

Resources to learn Power Query

Tutorials

Power Query M Primer (part 1):Introduction, Simple Expressions & let
Ben Gribaudo dives into Power Query topic by topic

Part 1: Introduction to let expressions
Part 3: Using and writing Functions
Part 8: Time: date, time, datetime, datetimezone and duration
Part 11-13: Tables
Part 15: Error handling
Part 16: Power Query primative types
Part 17: Facets
Part 18: Custom types


Chris Webb’s blog: Crossjoin.co.uk
Another high quality resource.
Using The RelativePath And Query Options With Web.Contents() In Power Query And Power BI M Code
How to use Web API’s through Web.Content‘s Query and RelativePath parameters
Web.Contents(), M Functions And Dataset Refresh Errors In Power BI
He knew how to fix Web.Contents() refresh errors all the way back in 2016!

Documentation

Tools

VS Code extension: Power Query

If you use the advanced editor check this out.
It supports autocomplete Tool tips display optional parameters.

VS Code extension: Power Query uses PowerQuery-Parser and PowerQuery-Formatter

Query Diagnostics

Query Diagnostics in Power BI

Tips

You can copy -> paste multiple queries into a new Power BI Report (notice it included a required referenced query ListAsText even though I didn’t select it.
You can copy -> paste multiple queries into at text editor

Categories
Power BI Power Query

Importing text files in Power BI

What do you do when text files are not formatted as .csv or .json ? If they repeat a pattern, you can automate it.

( You can download the final .PBIX report here )

This file always uses:

  • 3 values for for each “table” row
  • One line per value – which becomes our “columns”
  • every “column” line has a : in it. If you skip all lines without a : it filters all unwanted lines
Title
---------------------
DeviceID: One
Info1: One:Info1
Info2: One:Info2

---------------------

DeviceID: Two
Info1: Two: Info1
Info2: Two: Info2

---------------------

DeviceID: DeviceID
Info1: Three: Info1
Info2: Three: Info2

First take a look at the final function. Then I’ll explain how it works.

The main query calls a custom function

ConvertTableFromTextLines( "c:\data\sample.txt", ":", 3 )

All the work is one here

let  ConvertTableFromText = (filepath as text, splitCharacter as text, linesPerRecord as number, optional encoding as nullable number) as table =>
    let
        TextLines = Lines.FromBinary(
            File.Contents( filepath, null ),
            null,
            null,
            encoding ?? TextEncoding.Utf8
        ),
        TextLineTable = Table.FromColumns(
            { TextLines }, {"Line"}
        ),

        Pairs = Table.SelectRows(
            TextLineTable,
            each Text.Contains( [Line], splitCharacter )
        ),

        SingleRecordAsCols = Table.SplitColumn(
            Pairs,
            "Line",
            Splitter.SplitTextByEachDelimiter(
                { splitCharacter }, QuoteStyle.Csv, false
            ),
            {"Name", "Value"}
        ),

        TotalLines = Table.RowCount( SingleRecordAsCols ) ,
        NumberOfGroups = TotalLines / linesPerRecord,

        ListOfRecords = List.Generate(
            () => 0,
            each _ < NumberOfGroups,
            each _ + 1,
            each (
                Record.FromTable(
                    Table.Range(
                        SingleRecordAsCols,
                        _ * linesPerRecord,
                        linesPerRecord
                    )
                )
            )
        ),
        t = Table.FromList(
            ListOfRecords, Splitter.SplitByNothing(), null, null, ExtraValues.Error
        ),

        columnNameList = Record.FieldNames( ListOfRecords{0} ),

        TableOfRecords = Table.ExpandRecordColumn(
            t, "Column1", columnNameList, columnNameList

        )
    in
        TableOfRecords
in
    ConvertTableFromText

First we load the text file as a list. File.Contents( filepath ) reads all file types. Lines.FromBinary( Contents ) converts it into text. Depending on how the file was saved, you may need to set the encoding

Don’t worry if encoding sounds scary. If text loads with the wrong characters, try the other one. Two good ones to try first are:

TextEncoding.WindowsPower BI defaults to this for windows files
TextEncoding.Utf8Anything on the internet uses UTF8 by default.
Tip: If a file truly is ASCII then UTF8 will work

Next remove any lines that are missing :

Then split each line into two columns:
Transform Column -> Text -> Split -> By Delimiter

I started with these options

I renamed them to Name and Value because they will be converted into records.

To convert multiple lines into a single recordI used List.Generate. You can think of it like a for loop

There are

  • 3 lines per record
  • 9 total lines = the number of lines in the file
  • 3 total groups = 9 total lines / 3 lines per record

We need to loop 3 times. I’ll recreate a loop like this, converted to Power Query

for( $i = 0 ; $i < NumberOfGroups; $i += 1){
    CreateRecord()
}

List.Generate() has 4 arguments. Each one is a function. It uses:

  • initialize sets your starting condition. ( set i to 0 )
  • condition tests if we’ve reached the total number of groups
  • next changes the value of i. We want to add 1
    optional selector function creates the value every loop. This calls CreateRecord() once for every loop
    ListOfRecords = List.Generate(
        () => 0,
        each _ < NumberOfGroups,
        each _ + 1,
        each (
            Record.FromTable( 
                Table.Range(
                    SingleRecordAsCols,
                    _ * linesPerRecord,
                    linesPerRecord
                )
            )
        )
    ),

The next function first grabs rows from the table SingleRecordAsCols. It converts those into a single record

Every loop 3 is added to the offset.

i valueoffsetcount
00 * 3 = 03
11 * 3 = 33
22 * 3 = 63

You end up with a list of records

Choose convert to table

Finally expand records to columns

The final result:

Categories
References And Cheat Sheets

The many names of Microsoft

Current namePrevious names
Power AutomateFlow
Power QueryM
PowershellPowershell Core (this is opensource and uses .net core)
Windows PowershellPowershell (this uses .net )
Azure Data StudioSQL Operations Studio