With all the Fabric announcements in the last months, some of the Admin announcements might have slipped through. As you might know, the Admin part of Fabric is dear to my heart. I've posted about it earlier here, here, here, and here, to name a few 😀.
So in the next weeks I am going to highlight a few things with short, informative posts.
Fabric, Power BI, Power Platform, Data Platform
Blogging about Microsoft Fabric, Power BI, Power Platform and other things I find interesting.
Monday, February 17, 2025
Governance & Administration - Default Domain settings
Monday, February 10, 2025
Governance & Administration - Fabric Administrator Role
With all the Fabric announcements in the last months, some of the Admin announcements might have slipped through. As you might know, the Admin part of Fabric is dear to my heart. I've posted about it earlier here, here, here, and here, to name a few 😀.
So in the next weeks I am going to highlight a few things with short, informative posts.
- What rights does an Admin have?
- Are there more people that also have these rights? (Hint: YES! 😉)
Manage Fabric Administrators
Power Platform Administrator
Just In Time Access Roles
This means that people might need to activate the Fabric Admin role (for a period of time) before it becomes active. In the below screenshot you can see that Ernst and me have the role permanently assigned for Powerdobs.
Wrap up
- Global Admin
- Power Platform Administrator
- Fabric Administrator
Wednesday, January 29, 2025
Governance & Administration - Ownership Takeover for Fabric Items
With all the Fabric announcements in the last months, some of the Admin announcements might have slipped through. As you might know, the Admin part of Fabric is dear to my heart. I've posted about it earlier here, here, here, and here, to name a few 😀.
So in the next weeks I am going to highlight a few things with short, informative posts.
- You need read and write permissions to the item you want to take over
- That means a Contributor or higher role in the workspace
- Depending on the item you transfer, you might need to set up/refresh credentials for connections, as explained here
- The old way of taking ownership of Power BI items will still remain the same
- Mirrored databases are not supported (yet)
- If you're taking over a pipeline that execute's other items (like a notebook), you have to take over ownership of that item separately
Wrap up
Tuesday, December 31, 2024
Closing out on 2024
It's the holiday season again, already!
This year has been marked by significant advancements in Microsoft Fabric, and Power BI in specific, and I've had the privilege of engaging with these developments both personally and professionally.
Blogging
I can say I haven't been that active on my blog, I always have a lot of plans for the new year, but motivation is still not easy.. 😆 Let's not make plans this year, but just start blogging for myself and not for others or the views, and see what that brings.
5th Year MVP
One of the highlights of the year was being recognized once again as a Microsoft MVP. It’s a privilege to be part of this amazing program, and I’m very grateful for the opportunities it provides, to share knowledge, collaborate with brilliant minds, contribute to the data community and create new friendships.
Microsoft Ignite 2024: A Glimpse into the Future
One of the biggest events this year was Microsoft Ignite 2024, held in Chicago. The conference had some great innovations, with the number one being the introduction of Fabric SQL Database (in preview). This developer-friendly, transactional database, based on Azure SQL Database, offers seamless creation of operational (OLTP) databases within Fabric. Its integration with OneLake ensures near-real-time data replication, bridging the gap between transactional and analytical processing.
Another noteworthy feature introduced was the Metrics Hub (also in preview), setting a new standard in how organizations define, track, and share KPIs. This centralized management system integrates effortlessly with Power BI, promoting consistency and enhanced collaboration across teams.
Community Engagements and Speaking Opportunities
This year also provided new opportunities to connect with the data community through various speaking engagements. Events like DataGrillen in Germany and the 1st Fabric Conference in Europe were particularly memorable. Sharing insights on topics such as Administration and Governance in Fabric, and engaging in lively discussions with fellow data enthusiasts, was both fulfilling and inspiring. This extended beyond sessions, with early morning runs and social gatherings strengthening the relationships with old and new friends in the community.
Looking Ahead
As we are moving into the new year, my agenda is already filled with promising developments. The upcoming Fabric February 2025 event in Oslo, Norway, is an occasion that promises to bring together the best minds in the industry. And in March the MVP Summit in Redmond will be another highlight!
It's an exciting time to be part of the data community, and I look forward to continuing this journey with all of you, exploring new technologies, sharing knowledge, and fostering the collaborative spirit that defines our field.
Thank you for being a part of this year's journey. Wishing you all a great New Year's Eve and an insightful 2025 ahead!
Nicky. Out.
P.S. I should mention that I did use AI to create a summary of events of my blog and my LinkedIn posts. I used that as a basis for this post.
Saturday, November 30, 2024
Microsoft Ignite 2024 - My Key Highlights
Last week was the annual Microsoft Ignite conference in Chicago. In this blog, I will take you through my most important highlights of the sessions.
Fabric SQL Database (Preview): The future of SQL in the cloud
Let's get straight to the point with the biggest announcement: Fabric SQL Database!
SQL Database in Microsoft Fabric is a developer-friendly, transactional database, based on Azure SQL Database, with which you can easily create an operational (OLTP) database in Fabric. In addition to the Fabric Lakehouse and the Warehouse, you now also have an efficient SaaS SQL database at your disposal as a developer with the performance of a transactional database and under the hood a(n extra) storage that is optimized for analytical purposes (Delta Parquet).
SQL Database in Fabric is:
- The home of OLTP workloads in Fabric
- Easy to configure and manage
- Set up for analytics by automatically replicating data to OneLake in near-real-time
- Based on the underlying technology of Mirroring in Fabric
- Under the hood, the same as Azure SQL Database, plus you have a web-based editor in the Fabric portal
With the introduction of Fabric SQL Database, Microsoft is taking traditional database management to a new level:
- Simple and secure architecture: Automated management and scaling optimizations
- Source control integration and CI/CD support: Essential for modern DevOps processes
- Capacity billing: Pausable compute resources ensure cost efficiency
- Unique cross-platform capabilities: Perform JOINs across databases, warehouses, and lakehouses
Metrics Hub: Standardized Metric management in Fabric (Preview)
The introduction of the Metrics Hub in Fabric is a new standard in how organizations define, track, and share KPIs. This new approach integrates seamlessly with Power BI and provides centralized management for metrics, enabling consistency and better collaboration. You might be thinking, this sounds familiar? You are! 😊 First there was Metrics, then Goals, and now the Metrics Hub where you can create Metric sets.Fabric AI Capacities
There will be an option to run all AI (=Copilot) compute on a separate capacity, so that other Fabric workloads are not affected by the use of Copilot. You still need at least an F64, and it's not available in all Azure regions, so be sure to check the Copilot FAQ for all your questions.Fabric Org Apps
Org apps is a new item in your workspace, which now allows you to create an app as you did before by publishing an App in your workspace. One of the benefits of this is that you can create multiple Org apps per workspace!In addition, you can customize more things like the design and behavior of the app. However, you can still only add items from the current workspace.
It is important to know that there is a tenant setting for Org apps that you need to activate. You can also use Org apps with a trial capacity.
- In addition to Power BI reports, you can now also add Fabric notebooks and real-time dashboards
- The distribution of org apps has been simplified, because access to underlying items (e.g. semantic models) is also applied, even in other workspaces. Users will therefore receive read access to all items that are dependent on the items in the app. These rights will also be removed when a user is deleted. There are a few exceptions, so check this.
- The items in an Org app are no longer a copy of the item, but the original items from the workspace
- Check all the differences between workspace and Org apps here
Power BI
- The biggest update by far: write-back with User Data Functions: native write-back integration with reusable functions and new options to link these to buttons in Power BI, with which you can update data in a source
- In the Pipeline activity, you can now refresh a semantic model at table and partition level
- Dataflow Gen2 updates: this item will soon also be supported in CI/CD (in source control and deployment pipelines)
OneLake
- Shortcuts with Iceberg tables: Direct integrations with Snowflake and other platforms
- Mirroring: Support for Azure SQL and Snowflake (GA)
- Cross-cloud JOINs: Analyze datasets spread across different clouds and formats: You can combine SQL Database, Lakehouses and Warehouses in one query
- Open mirroring (preview): this allows you to write change data from any application directly into a mirrored database in Fabric. Open mirroring is based on the open Delta Lake table format
Platform
- Workspace monitoring (not to be confused with the Admin Monitoring workspace, this is intended for tenant insights): a database in your workspace that records log data and metrics about all items in that workspace. All of this is recorded in a real-time intelligence Eventhouse database. There are example queries in the Fabric samples GitHub.
- Surge protection for capacities: This capability is coming soon, and it allows you to set a cap on the background workload of a capacity. This helps to better guarantee the availability of interactive workloads (such as Power BI report usage). You can set this per capacity.
- OneLake catalog: This is the new central hub to find, search, and use all Fabric items. You can use all available filters, including new ones like domains and tags. You can explore in-place items and view details.
Conclusion
Ignite 2024 showed that Microsoft is strongly committed to an integrated and future-oriented data platform, with AI and Copilot as a common thread. Innovations such as workspace monitoring, improved security through service principal support, and the advanced capabilities of the OneLake Catalog make it easier than ever to manage data effectively.I believe that with these developments, the Microsoft Intelligent Data Platform is ready to support organizations in an increasingly data-intensive world.
Do you have any highlights from Ignite that I missed? Then let me know in the comments!
Items that are being worked on now and in the future are often public via the Fabric roadmap. There you can find per workload the items that will be worked on in the coming 6-12 months.
Some examples:
- A new Fabric navigation experience
- Support for folders for Git integration
- Better ownership of Fabric items
- Fabric Capacity Metrics Cross-capacity insights
- Capacity Metrics Chargeback
Friday, May 31, 2024
My DataGrillen Adventure: Speaking, Connecting, and New Friendships
I just got back from an incredible trip to DataGrillen, and I can’t wait to share my experiences with you. If you haven’t heard of it, DataGrillen is this amazing community-driven conference in Germany, where data professionals from around the world gather to share knowledge, ideas, and, of course, some good BBQ and beers. This year was special for me because I had the honor of speaking again at the event.
A special thanks goes out to Ben (@bweissman) & William (@sql_williamd) for organizing the event! But let's start from the beginning.
The Journey Begins
The anticipation was building as I packed up the car, later picked up Eduard Koekkoek (@heartforarts) and set off on our road trip to Germany. Eduard, a great friend and fellow data enthusiast, was the perfect companion for the journey. We spent some time on the road discussing everything from the latest in data technologies to our expectations for the conference. The drive was quite long, but the conversation made it fly by.
Stepping onto the Stage
The highlight of my trip was undoubtedly my speaking session. I had the first session at the first day, just after the opening "ceremony". The preparation that goes into a talk is always intense, but the passion I have for the subject kept me going. The topic was close to my heart, Administration and Governance in Fabric, and I was thrilled to see a room of fellow data enthusiasts ready to dive into the discussion.
The audience was incredibly receptive, and the interaction was great. There’s something deeply fulfilling about sharing knowledge and seeing that spark of understanding and curiosity in others. The Q&A session that followed was lively, with thoughtful questions. It’s moments like these that remind me why I really like what I do.
Reconnecting with Old Friends
One of the best parts of conferences is the chance to reconnect with friends and colleagues from the industry. DataGrillen was no exception. With the change of forgetting someone, I won't call out names here 😀
It was like a reunion of sorts, seeing familiar faces, catching up on the latest in our professional and personal lives, and talking about past conferences and projects. There’s a special bond that forms when you share experiences and challenges over the years, and DataGrillen provided the perfect backdrop for these reunions.
A smaller group of people, specifically people into running, like to get together for an early run on days of a conference. We created a very special, long-running thread on Twitter (a.k.a. X), that actually started 2 years ago at DataGrillen!
Ran a little bit more 😊🥵 pic.twitter.com/dWM8mNwwo4
— Koen Verbeeck 🇺🇦 🌈 (@Ko_Ver) May 17, 2024
Furthermore, we exchanged ideas over beers and BBQ, debated the future of data technologies, and shared a lot of laughs. These moments are invaluable, and they remind me of the strength and warmth of the data community. It's not just about the work we do, but the friendships we forge along the way.
Making New Connections
While reconnecting with old friends was wonderful, making new ones was equally exhilarating. DataGrillen attracted a diverse crowd of professionals, each bringing unique perspectives and experiences. I met so many passionate individuals, each conversation was a learning opportunity, and a chance to see the data world through a different lens.
The DataGrillen Vibe
What sets DataGrillen apart is its atmosphere. The organizers have created an environment that fosters learning and networking in the most enjoyable way possible. The BBQ element adds a fun twist, making the conference feel more like a community gathering than a formal event. It’s the perfect balance of professional development and relaxation.
Looking Ahead
As Eduard and I drove back home, I felt a great sense of satisfaction and inspiration. DataGrillen was more than just a conference: it was a reminder of the incredible community we’re all part of. I left with new knowledge, strengthened friendships, and a bunch of new connections that I’m excited to nurture.
If you ever get the chance to attend DataGrillen, don’t hesitate. It’s an experience that goes beyond the sessions and keynotes – it’s about the people, the conversations, and the community. I’m already looking forward to next year’s event!
Session materials
My slides were already shared with the conference, but in case you haven't found them, you can find them at my GitHub.
I've also uploaded the template file I used in my demo for Admin Monitoring to the above page.
First page of my demo file |
You can also find slides of previous conferences there. I generally follow this pattern: https://github.com/NickyvVr/talks/tree/master/slides/YYYY/yyyymmdd [Conference name]
Until next time, keep learning, keep sharing, and keep grilling!
Friday, April 26, 2024
Deprecation of Legacy Power BI Apps!
TL;DR
- You will get a different URL (AppID)
- Any custom changes that users did are gone, so e.g. personal bookmarks and comments
What does this actually mean?
Why do I want to upgrade?
- Content Management: In the new Power BI apps with audiences, you
canhave to add content via the Update app feature by navigating to the Content tab and clicking Add content. In the legacy app you used to include content by using the app toggle in the workspace. This toggle will not be supported anymore, although it is still shown in the workspace.
- Audiences: You can use different audiences for separate authorizations to a subsection of reports from the workspace. If you are using the default access request method, you also need to provide an audience group in the drop-down button with a pending access request before you can approve it.
- Content visibility: By default, all newly added content to an already published app is marked as invisible. App authors must manually unhide content for each audience group.
Upgrade process
Other updates to apps
- The number of audiences has been increased (from 10) to 25
- You can now enable custom messaging for handling app access requests
- At the Fabric Community Conference in Las Vegas: Multiple apps per workspace coming soon!
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