This article was published as a part of the Data Science Blogathon.
Introduction
Microsoft’s Power BI is one of its rapidly growing corporate analytics services. This self-service business intelligence tool is the latest and greatest in the data-driven industry. It eased the workaround for attaining data from several sources and consolidating it into one management tool.
Many of the world’s leading companies use Microsoft Power BI to gain superior business insights. In addition, Microsoft Power BI has been positioned in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for the fifteenth year as premier analytics and business intelligence platform. In the next years, Power BI will continue to be an industry leader in scope. If you enjoy working with data, visualizations, gaining insights, etc., obtaining a Power BI certification could stand you apart in the job market.
What is Power BI?
Microsoft’s Power BI is a business analytics solution that allows the transformation of disparate data sources into insightful and interactive insights. These data may be stored in an Excel spreadsheet or hybrid cloud/on-premises data warehousing. You can easily connect to all your data sources and distribute the resulting insights to everyone.
Power BI is the current buzzword in the data-driven IT business. Numerous power BI potentials exist across several editions. With enough understanding of the equipment, it is simple to seize chances as a:
- Power BI data analyst
- Power BI consultant
- Power BI software engineer
- Power BI project manager
- Power BI developer
- SQL Server Power BI developer
Interview Questions
1. What are Power BI’s most important elements?
- Power Pivot: It is used for data modeling that employs DAX (Data Analysis Expression) functions. Here, we can build relationships between many tables and get values that may be shown in pivot tables.
- Power View: The Power View presents data intelligibly and gets metadata for data analysis. The views are interactive, and slicers and filters are available for manipulating the data.
- Power BI Desktop: Power Desktop is a Power Query, Power View, and Power Pivot integration tool. It facilitates the creation of complex queries, data models, reports, and dashboards, along with developing BI skills for data analysis.
- The Power BI Mobile App is available on Android, iOS, and even Windows operating systems. The App has an interactive dashboard display that can be shared.
- Power BI Map: It displays geospatial visualization of the data in three-dimensional mode. The data may be highlighted based on geographical location, a continent, state, city, or street address.
- Power BI Q&A: It is used to deliver responses to user-posed inquiries. It is compatible with Power View and may be replied with diagrams using Power Q&A.
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2. What is Microsoft’s Power BI Gateway?
Power BI Gateway is a software program to access on-premises network data from the cloud. Gateways are gatekeepers for data sources located on-premises. Requests for access to on-premises data from cloud or web-based applications are sent through the gateway. The gateway handles all connection requests and grants access depending on the user’s authentication and criteria.
Gateways do not transmit data from the source on-premises to the client platform. It just links the platform to the on-premises data source so that customers can easily access the data. Gateways have employed a link between a single or several data sources and an on-premises data source.
3. What is the Dax Function used by Power BI?
Data Analysis Expression (DAX) is a formula library for data analysis and computation. This library includes calculation-performing functions, constants, and operators. DAX facilitates the optimal usage of data sets and the generation of meaningful outputs.
DAX is a functional programming language that supports conditional statements, nested functions, value references, and much more. There are either numeric (integers, decimals, etc.) or non-numerical formulae (string, binary). Every DAX formula begins with an equal sign.
DAX Syntax:
Total Sales = SUM(Sales[SalesAmount])
Where ‘Total Sales’ represents ‘Measure,’ ‘SUM’ represents ‘DAX Function,’ and ‘Sales[SalesAmount]’ is the table and column reference.
4. What are Microsoft’s Power BI formats?
The several Power BI formats are as follows:
- Power BI Desktop – You may download and install Power BI Desktop on your computer. With templates, you may connect it to the data source, convert the data, and analyze and visualize it.
- Power BI Services – Power BI Services is a cloud-based Service-as-a-Platform.
- Power BI Mobile App – The Power BI Mobile App is available for iOS, Android, and Windows.
5. What do you mean by the content pack in Power BI?
A content pack is a pre-assembled collection of visualizations, and Power BI reports created with your preferred service. Instead of writing a report from scratch, you would utilize a content pack when you need to start quickly.
6. What visualization types does Power BI support?
Visualization is the rendering of data graphically. Using visualizations, we may generate reports and dashboards. Power BI visualizations include Bar charts, Column charts, Line charts, Area charts, Stacked area charts, Ribbon charts, Waterfall charts, Scatter charts, Pie charts, Donut charts, Treemap charts, Maps, Funnel charts, Gauge charts, Cards, KPI, Slicers, Tables, Matrix, R script visualizations, and Python visualizations, among others.
7. Where does Power BI store data?
When data is imported into Power BI, it is stored primarily in Fact and Dimension tables.
- Fact tables: The central table in a star design of a data warehouse, the fact tables hold non-standardized quantitative data for analysis.
- Dimension tables: Dimension tables are the only additional table in the star schema used to record characteristics and dimensions that characterize entities in the fact table.
8. What is Power BI’s complete functioning system?
Microsoft’s Power BI system consists mainly of three steps:
- Data Integration: Data Integration begins with the extraction and integration of data from disparate data sources. After integration, the data is converted into a standardized format and stored in a staging area.
- Data Processing: After the data has been compiled and merged, it must be cleansed before processing. Therefore, a few modifications and cleaning operations are done on the data to remove redundant numbers, etc., as raw data is not very valuable. The modified data is then stored in data warehouses.
- Data Presentation: Now that the data has been translated and cleansed, It is shown on the Power BI desktop in the form of reports, dashboards, and scorecards. These reports may be shared with multiple corporate users through mobile apps or the web.
9. What does the advanced editor do?
The advanced editor inspects queries that Power BI is enforced on data sources that are importing data. M-code is used to render the query. Users that wish to inspect the query code pick “Edit Queries” from the Home tab, then “Advanced Editor” to modify the query. Changes are stored in the Applied Steps section of the Query Settings.
10. What do you understand by Power BI Designer?
Power BI Designer, a powerful and flexible tool under the Power BI umbrella, allows users to build intuitive reports and dashboards easily and swiftly and to modify the visual perspectives of their data on the fly for improved analytics and well-informed decision. This designer is replete with drag-and-drop features that allow users to position content accurately where they want it on the report canvas systematically.
11. Mention the disadvantages and restrictions of using Power BI.
The following are some of Power BI’s limitations:
- Complex in nature: Power BI has a fairly sophisticated design. Users must comprehensively understand Power BI before they can begin using it.
- Problems with Large Data: Power BI cannot analyze large datasets and may stall out when trying to do so. It is unable to handle files larger than 1 GB.
- Limited Sharing of Data: Users who are on the same domain or whose email addresses are designated in Office 365 are the only ones who may get the files you share.
- Limited Source of Data: Power BI allows real-time connectivity with a small number of data sources.
Conclusion
Microsoft Power BI is the focus of this article. An analytics system developed by Microsoft, Power BI facilitates the conversion of diverse data sources into relevant and interactive insights. A fast-growing corporate analytics service from the company. Some key takeaways from the article are:
- What are Power BI and its important elements?
- A complete functioning system of Power BI.
- Where does Microsoft’s Power BI store data?
- Disadvantages and restrictions of Power BI.
- In addition to Power BI Gateway, Power BI Designer, and Power BI Formats, other subjects are also covered.
I hope this Microsoft’s Power BI Interview Questions and Answers help you prepare for your upcoming interviews. Wishing you the best!
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Hello, my name is Prashant, and I'm currently pursuing my Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech) degree. I'm in my 3rd year of study, specializing in machine learning, and attending VIT University.
In addition to my academic pursuits, I enjoy traveling, blogging, and sports. I'm also a member of the sports club. I'm constantly looking for opportunities to learn and grow both inside and outside the classroom, and I'm excited about the possibilities that my B.Tech degree can offer me in terms of future career prospects.
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