Pl-300 Certification: Microsoft Power Bi Data Analyst (Last updated 7/2023)

Learn skills for Microsoft PL-300 certification using the free Power BI Desktop. Power Query, DAX, M, more. (Was DA-100)

What you'll learn

Download for free and install and run the full version of Power BI Desktop, the BI and analysis software.

Be able to create analyses, such as line charts, stacked bar charts, or geographic analyses using maps.

You will be able to format numbers and dates, and add labels, tooltips and animation.

You will be able to Get and Transform multiple sources of data, including merging multiple files from a folder, pivoting and unpivotting.

Building and refine models, including adding calculated columns and measures.

You will learn the important M and DAX functions, to enable you to build your own formulas.

Requirements

Before you begin this course, you should have a computer with access to the internet, and be able to install Windows programs.

You will need Windows 8.1, 10 or 11 or Windows Server 2012 R2 or later, to install the Power BI Desktop program.

That's it! The more experience in reporting using other packages including Excel, the better, but it is not essential.

If you have a Mac, then you will need to be able to either dual-boot into Windows, or use Parallel Desktop boot into Windows. However, Mac users can use the Power BI Service, and be able to do most of Part 1 and Part 4 of this course.

Description

This course covers the content required for the PL-300 certification exam. It has been updated in line with the March-June 2023 User Interface update for on-object interaction.What do students like you say about this course?Girma says: "This is another great course taught by the instructor – well-paced, every important aspects of Power BI are discussed in detail. I gained the real power of Power BI in this course."Mohan says: "Another Excellent course by Mr Burton. This course can be used as a refresher , manual reference to review, understand and use Power BI tools efficiently. Explanations are very clear and crisp. Can help from Beginner to Intermediate level learning."Andrew says: "I took a similar Power BI course through my work and I think this one is better. Highly recommend this training. I am a Lead ERP Financial Systems Analyst who worked mostly with Oracle BI tools. Company wants to go in a different direction so I am learning Power BI."Do you already use reporting software such as Access, SSRS, Tableau or WebI? Or is this your first reporting software tool? Either way, welcome.In this course, learn the skills that Microsoft want you to know, and add another tool to your CV, and even go for the Microsoft Power BI certification.Power BI is one of the most requested reporting tools that are requested in the job market, and the ability to being able to use it now could be very useful for your current work, and your next job hunt.This course comes in four parts:Part 1 - Creating Visualizations (also known as Visualize the Data, and Analyze the Data)We'll download and install for free Power BI Desktop. We'll start by creating our first visualizations (vizzes) and investigate the Power BI interface.We'll look at the various visualisations available, and go through their common properties. We'll create maps, hierarchies, KPIs, guages, and all sorts of chart types. Part 2 - Get and Transform Data (also known as Prepare the Data)We see how data can be transformed, saving you time in analysing the data. We'll look at sorting and filtering, split columns, and other transform activities. We'll merge, append and combine queries together. We'll Pivot and Unpivot, and transform text, numbers, dates and times, and create custom columns using the M language.Part 3 - Refining the model (also known as Model the Data)We'll see how relationships can be made through multiple tables, and refine the data with custom columns and measures using the DAX language.Part 4 - Power BI ServiceWe'll then publish our visualisations onto the Power BI Service (which you can sign up for free), and then from your reports create dashboards. With the Power BI Pro (for which you can get a free trial), you can also create workspaces and apps.The course will take around 28 hours to complete, but completing this will enable you to create vizzes, dashboards and stories of your own, and know how to overcome common problems.The course increases in difficulty slowly, so you'll create for instance a table or basic bar chart, then turn it into a stacked bar chart, and investigate more of their properties, step by step.The course is fairly relaxed - there will be a few "wrong turns", so you can see what problems might arise, but every lesson works towards an end goal at a relatively slow pace, so you can follow on your own computer easily. I assume that you know how to use a computer, including installing programs, but the actual analysis will be at a basic level, and I'll introduce every component as we go on.At the end of the course, you can download a certificate of completion, so you can show everyone your new-found skills, and be able to start creating analyses for yourselves. And with a bit of practice, you could also go for the official Microsoft PL-300 exam - wouldn’t that certificate look good on your CV or resume?

Overview

Section 1: Introduction

Lecture 1 Introduction

Lecture 2 Welcome to Udemy

Lecture 3 The Udemy Interface

Lecture 4 Do you want auto-translated subtitles in more languages?

Lecture 5 What are we going to learn?

Lecture 6 Installing Power BI Desktop

Lecture 7 Resources

Lecture 8 Saved Power BI files

Section 2: Part 1 Level 1: Creating and formatting a table visualization

Lecture 9 Welcome to Part 1: Visualizations

Lecture 10 Importing from Excel, and Creating our first visualization

Lecture 11 Exploring Power BI Desktop - Report view

Lecture 12 Exploring Power BI Desktop - Data view

Lecture 13 Focus mode and Different visualizations

Lecture 14 Why do I need a Work email address? And how can I get one, if I don't have it?

Lecture 15 Saving visualization to the Desktop and to the Power BI service

Lecture 16 Practice Activity Number 1

Lecture 17 Practice Activity Number 1 - The Solution

Section 3: Part 1 Level 2: Formatting our first visualization

Lecture 18 Opening the Format Pane - for older versions of Power BI

Lecture 19 Exploring the Format Pane (for all versions of Power BI)

Lecture 20 Formatting using On-object Interaction

Lecture 21 Formatting font and font size

Lecture 22 Formatting colors

Lecture 23 Stylistic options

Lecture 24 Position visuals

Lecture 25 Align visuals

Lecture 26 Format Painter

Lecture 27 Configuring summarization, both default and in a specific visualization

Lecture 28 Changing number and date formatting

Lecture 29 Custom number and date formatting

Lecture 30 Practice Activity Number 2

Lecture 31 Practice Activity Number 2 - The Solution

Section 4: Part 1 Level 3: Creating different visualizations: Matrices and bar charts

Lecture 32 Matrix

Lecture 33 Drill down data, see data and records, and export data

Lecture 34 Stacked bar charts and switch theme for reports

Lecture 35 Bar Chart formatting, including continuous versus categorical axes

Lecture 36 Configure interactions between visual (Edit interactions)

Lecture 37 Clustered and 100% Stacked bar charts

Lecture 38 Line and area charts, including 8b. Configure duplicate pages

Lecture 39 Combo charts (Line and column charts)

Lecture 40 Practice Activity Number 3

Lecture 41 Practice Activity Number 3 - The Solution

Section 5: Part 1 Level 4: Adding more control to your visualizations

Lecture 42 Adding Text boxes, Images and Shapes

Lecture 43 Visual level, page level and report level filters - basic filters

Lecture 44 Advanced Filtering

Lecture 45 Filter Top N Items

Lecture 46 Slicer

Lecture 47 Synchronizing slicers to multiple pages

Lecture 48 Slicer Warning

Lecture 49 Sort visuals

Lecture 50 Configure small multiples

Lecture 51 Use Bookmarks for reports

Lecture 52 Group and layer visuals by using the Selection pane

Lecture 53 Drillthrough

Lecture 54 Buttons and Actions

Lecture 55 Page Navigation and Drill through actions

Lecture 56 Enable Natural Language Queries (Ask A Question) and Page Formatting

Lecture 57 Tooltip Pages

Lecture 58 Page and Bookmark Navigator

Lecture 59 Practice Activity Number 4

Lecture 60 Practice Activity Number 4 - The Solution

Section 6: Part 1 Level 5: Other visualizations

Lecture 61 Ribbon charts

Lecture 62 Waterfall charts

Lecture 63 Scatter, bubble and dot charts

Lecture 64 Pie charts and donut charts

Lecture 65 Treemaps

Lecture 66 Funnel charts

Lecture 67 Adding Marketplace visualizations (Import a Custom Visual)

Lecture 68 Practice Activity Number 5

Lecture 69 Practice Activity Number 5 - The Solution

Section 7: Part 1 Level 6: Mapping

Lecture 70 Maps

Lecture 71 Formatting maps

Lecture 72 Adding Data Categories

Lecture 73 Filled Maps,Conditional Formatting, and color blindness

Lecture 74 Creating hierarchies

Lecture 75 ArcGIS Maps for Power BI

Lecture 76 Practice Activity Number 6

Lecture 77 Practice Activity Number 6 - The Solution

Section 8: Part 1 Level 7: Measure performance by using KPIs, gauges and cards

Lecture 78 Gauges

Lecture 79 Cards and Multi-row cards

Lecture 80 More conditional formatting

Lecture 81 KPIs

Lecture 82 Practice Activity Number 7

Lecture 83 Practice Activity Number 7 - The Solution

Section 9: Part 1 Level 8: Other Visualization Items for the exam

Lecture 84 Define quick measures

Lecture 85 Export report data

Lecture 86 Create reference lines by using Analytics pane, including the Forecast feature

Lecture 87 Use error bars

Lecture 88 Identify outliers

Lecture 89 Use clustering

Lecture 90 Use Anomaly Detection

Lecture 91 Use groupings and binnings

Lecture 92 Use the AI Visual Key Influencers to explore dimensional variances

Lecture 93 Use the Analyze feature in Power BI

Lecture 94 Use the AI Visual decomposition tree visual to break down a measure

Lecture 95 Creating a paginated report

Lecture 96 Exploring Power BI Report Builder

Section 10: Additional videos - Visualize and Analyze the Data

Lecture 97 Not needed for the PL-300 exam

Lecture 98 Design and configure for accessibility

Lecture 99 Add a Smart Narrative visual

Lecture 100 R and Python Visualizations

Lecture 101 Use or create a PBIDS file

Section 11: End of Part 1

Lecture 102 End of Part 1

Section 12: Part 2 Get and Transform Data: Level 1 - Home Part 1

Lecture 103 Welcome to Part 2: Get and Transform Data

Lecture 104 Introduction - let's Get some more Data

Lecture 105 Exploring the Power Query Editor interface

Lecture 106 Introducing the M language

Lecture 107 Let's start look at the Home tab

Lecture 108 Home menu - Manage Columns

Lecture 109 Home menu - Reduce Rows and Use First Row as Headers

Lecture 110 Practice Activity Number 8

Lecture 111 Practice Activity Number 8 - The Solution

Section 13: Part 2 Level 1 - Get Data - Home

Lecture 112 Sort and Filter

Lecture 113 Split Column

Lecture 114 Other Transform activities

Lecture 115 Practice Activity Number 9

Lecture 116 Practice Activity Number 9 - The Solution

Section 14: Part 2 Level 2 - Getting Multiple files

Lecture 117 Merge Queries and Expand Table

Lecture 118 Merge Queries with Group By, and different types of Joins

Lecture 119 Comma Separated Files

Lecture 120 Appending two queries together

Lecture 121 Appending three or more queries together + resolving a problem with data types

Lecture 122 Combine Files (getting information from a folder)

Lecture 123 Practice Activity Number 10

Lecture 124 Practice Activity Number 10 - The Solution

Section 15: Part 2 Level 3 - Transform Menu

Lecture 125 Transform - Table and Any Column

Lecture 126 Pivot Column

Lecture 127 Unpivot

Lecture 128 Practice Activity Number 11

Lecture 129 Practice Activity 11 - The Solution

Lecture 130 Unpivot in conjunction with other Transform features

Lecture 131 Practice Activity Number 12

Lecture 132 Practice Activity 12 - The Solution

Section 16: Part 2 Level 4 - Transform - Text and Numbers

Lecture 133 Transform/Add Column - Text - Format

Lecture 134 Transform/Add Column - Text - Merge Columns

Lecture 135 Transform/Add Column - Text - Extract

Lecture 136 Transform/Add Column - Text - Parse

Lecture 137 Transform/Add Column - Number Column - Statistics and Standard

Lecture 138 Transform/Add Column - Other Number Column functions

Lecture 139 Practice Activity Number 13

Lecture 140 Practice Activity Number 13 - The Solution

Section 17: Part 2 Level 5 - Transform - Dates and Time

Lecture 141 Creating a list of dates

Lecture 142 Transform/Add Column - Date

Lecture 143 Transform/Add Column - Dates in other cultures/languages

Lecture 144 Transform/Add Column - Time

Lecture 145 Transform/Add column - Duration

Lecture 146 Practice Activity Number 14

Lecture 147 Practice Activity Number 14 - The Solution

Section 18: Part 2 Level 6 - Add Columns, View and Help Menus

Lecture 148 Column from examples - dates and numbers

Lecture 149 Column from examples - text

Lecture 150 Importing CSV/text files and Extract Tables Using Examples

Lecture 151 Conditional Column

Lecture 152 Resolving Errors from Conditional Columns

Lecture 153 Index Column and Duplicate Column

Lecture 154 Custom Column - If Then Else

Lecture 155 Converting text from a different locale to a number

Lecture 156 Practice Activity Number 15

Lecture 157 Practice Activity Number 15 - The Solution

Section 19: Part 2 Level 7 - View and Help menus and advanced functionality

Lecture 158 Other M Functions

Lecture 159 View and Help menus, including Column Properties

Lecture 160 Profile the data

Lecture 161 Advanced Editor

Lecture 162 Functions and Parameters

Lecture 163 DateTimeZone date type and Functions

Lecture 164 Worked Practice Activity Number 16 - Dividing Annual data into Months

Section 20: Part 2 Level 8 - Get other types of data

Lecture 165 Installing SQL Server

Lecture 166 Introduction to SQL Server

Lecture 167 Importing database data into Power BI, and Query Folding

Lecture 168 Expanding multiple tables in SQL Server

Lecture 169 Select a storage mode

Lecture 170 Importing data from SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS)

Lecture 171 Setting up Azure SQL Database

Lecture 172 Using Azure SQL Database in Power BI

Lecture 173 Use the Microsoft Dataverse

Lecture 174 Configure data loading

Section 21: Additional videos - Get and Transform

Lecture 175 Not needed for the PL-300 exam

Lecture 176 * Automatic page refresh

Lecture 177 * Using Big Data

Lecture 178 * Resolve problems

Lecture 179 * Identify query performance issues, including Query Diagnostics

Lecture 180 * Apply AI Insights

Section 22: End of Part 2

Lecture 181 End of Part 2

Section 23: Part 3 Level 1: Creating a Data Model

Lecture 182 Welcome to Part 3 - Modeling and DAX functions

Lecture 183 Get multiple data sets, and connecting them together

Lecture 184 The problems with direction of relationships between data sets

Lecture 185 Practice Activity Number 17

Lecture 186 Practice Activity Number 17 - The Solution

Section 24: Part 3 Level 2 - An introduction to DAX functions, including Logical functions

Lecture 187 DAX functions - A useful Resource

Lecture 188 Calculated columns - an introduction

Lecture 189 Basic operators

Lecture 190 IF, BLANK and ISBLANK

Lecture 191 AND, OR and NOT

Lecture 192 SWITCH

Lecture 193 Other functions

Lecture 194 Practice Activity Number 18

Lecture 195 Practice Activity Number 18 - The Solution

Section 25: Part 3 Level 3 - Statistical functions

Lecture 196 Measures - an introduction, with standard aggregations including Countblank

Lecture 197 Aggregation of calculations

Lecture 198 Other statistical functions

Lecture 199 Practice Activity Number 19

Lecture 200 Practice Activity Number 19 - The Solution

Section 26: Part 3 Level 4 - Mathematical functions

Lecture 201 Introduction to mathematical functions

Lecture 202 Rounding functions

Lecture 203 Division functions - MOD and QUOTIENT

Lecture 204 SIGN (and use with SWITCH) and ABS

Lecture 205 Exponential functions

Lecture 206 Other functions

Lecture 207 Practice Activity Number 20

Lecture 208 Practice Activity Number 20 - The Solution

Section 27: Part 3 Level 5 - Text functions

Lecture 209 Text searching

Lecture 210 Text extraction and substitution

Lecture 211 Text conversion

Lecture 212 Other functions

Lecture 213 Practice Activity Number 21

Lecture 214 Practice Activity Number 21 - The Solution

Section 28: Part 3 Level 6 - Information Functions

Lecture 215 ISERROR and LOOKUPVALUE

Lecture 216 Other functions

Lecture 217 Practice Activity Number 22

Lecture 218 Practice Activity Number 22 - The Solution

Section 29: Part 3 Level 7 - Filter and Value Functions

Lecture 219 RELATED - Flatten out a parent-child hierarchy

Lecture 220 Design a data model that uses a star schema

Lecture 221 RELATEDTABLE and COUNTROWS

Lecture 222 Context

Lecture 223 ALL

Lecture 224 FILTER

Lecture 225 CALCULATE

Lecture 226 ALLEXCEPT

Lecture 227 ALLSELECTED

Lecture 228 Other functions

Lecture 229 Practice Activity Number 23

Lecture 230 Practice Activity Number 23 - The Solution

Section 30: Part 3 Level 8 - Time Intelligence Functions

Lecture 231 Date and Time Functions

Lecture 232 FIRSTDATE, LASTDATE

Lecture 233 Start of… and End of…

Lecture 234 Previous… and Next…

Lecture 235 DATESINPERIOD

Lecture 236 DATESMTD, DATESQTD, DATESYTD, TOTALMTD, TOTALQTD, TOTALYTD

Lecture 237 Opening Balance and Closing Balance

Lecture 238 Semi-additive Measures

Lecture 239 SAMEPERIODLASTYEAR and PARALLELPERIOD

Lecture 240 Other Time Intelligence Functions

Lecture 241 Practice Activity Number 24

Lecture 242 Practice Activity Number 24 - The Solution

Section 31: Part 3 Level 9 - Other Modeling and DAX Topics for the exam

Lecture 243 Create calculated tables

Lecture 244 Create a common date table

Lecture 245 Define role-playing dimensions

Lecture 246 Resolve many-to-many relationships - Joint Bank Accounts

Lecture 247 Resolve many-to-many relationships - Different types of granularity

Lecture 248 Identify poorly performing measures, relationships, and visuals

Lecture 249 The Optimize menu

Lecture 250 Improve cardinality levels through summarization and by changing data types

Lecture 251 End of Part 3

Section 32: Part 4 Section 1 - An Introduction to the Power BI Service

Lecture 252 Welcome to Part 4: The Power BI Service

Lecture 253 Introducing The Power BI Service

Lecture 254 Logging into Power BI Service and a quick look around

Lecture 255 Power BI Terminology

Lecture 256 Datasets and Reports in the Power BI Service

Lecture 257 Yet another update!

Lecture 258 Get Data - Importing Your Data as a Dataset

Lecture 259 Get Data - Importing your data as a Workbook

Lecture 260 Other ways to Get Data

Lecture 261 The Navigation Pane, including Add a Quick Insights result to a report

Section 33: Part 4 Section 2 - Power BI Pro and adding users

Lecture 262 Signing up for Power BI Pro

Lecture 263 Adding new users

Lecture 264 Creating a new report

Lecture 265 Sharing my new report

Section 34: Part 4 Section 3 - Row Level Security

Lecture 266 Adding role-based Row Level Security

Lecture 267 Adding Dynamic Row Level Security

Lecture 268 Testing Dynamic Row Level Security in the Power BI Service

Section 35: Part 4 Section 4 - Dashboards

Lecture 269 Differences between dashboards and reports

Lecture 270 Manage Tiles on a Dashboard, Set Mobile View, and other Tiles options

Lecture 271 Dashboards: Options

Lecture 272 Configure Subscriptions

Lecture 273 Pin a Live Report Page to a Dashboard

Lecture 274 Use the Q&A Feature

Lecture 275 Add a Dashboard Theme

Lecture 276 Apply or Change Sensitivity Labels

Lecture 277 Configure Data Alerts

Section 36: Part 4 Section 5 - Manage datasets

Lecture 278 Analyze in Excel

Lecture 279 Promote or Certify (Endorse) a Dataset

Lecture 280 Manually Refreshing data in the Power BI Service

Lecture 281 Data Gateways; Providing Access to Datasets

Lecture 282 Where is Scheduled Refresh?

Lecture 283 Configure a Dataset Scheduled Refresh

Lecture 284 Configure Incremental Refresh Settings - Step 1

Lecture 285 Configure Incremental Refresh Settings - Step 2

Section 37: Part 4 Section 6 - Create and manage workspaces

Lecture 286 Create and Configure a Workspace

Lecture 287 Assign Workspace Roles

Lecture 288 Providing Access to Datasets

Lecture 289 Configure and Update a Workspace App

Lecture 290 Promote or certify Power BI report or app

Lecture 291 Publish, Import or Update Assets in a Workspace - Publish securely

Lecture 292 Publish reports on the web, so the public can see

Section 38: Part 4 Section 7 - Other Power BI Service Topics

Lecture 293 Create a PivotTable from a Power BI dataset in Excel

Lecture 294 Use or create a dataflow

Lecture 295 Creating Scorecards and Metrics

Lecture 296 Sharing Scorecards and Metrics

Lecture 297 Using Scorecards and Metrics

Section 39: Not needed for the PL-300 exam

Lecture 298 Not needed for the PL-300 exam

Lecture 299 Implement Object-Level Security

Lecture 300 Drillthrough from another report

Lecture 301 Export Data

Lecture 302 Recommend a Development Lifecycle Strategy

Lecture 303 Identify downstream dataset dependencies

Lecture 304 Personalize visuals

Lecture 305 Dataflow Scheduled Refresh and Endorsement

Lecture 306 Connect to a dataset using the XMLA endpoint

Lecture 307 Configure large dataset format

Lecture 308 Dashboard Data Classifications

Section 40: End of Part 4

Lecture 309 End of Part 4

Section 41: Well done

Lecture 310 That's almost it for the Power BI Service

Lecture 311 Congratulations for finishing the course!

Section 42: Bonus Lecture

Lecture 312 Bonus Lecture

This reporting course is meant for anyone who has no prior experience of Power BI. It's also for you if you have used it, but never designed a report.,It's great if you have created analyses in other reporting tools, such as Microsoft Access, WebI, SSRS, Tableau or Yellowfin, but it not essential. If you have, then it will be another string to your bow.,It would also be good if you had prior experience in using Excel formulas, but again, that is not essential.,No prior experience in reporting tools or creating formulas is required.,This course is probably not for you if you always know how to use Power BI and know how to create reports, although we will be looking at some more advanced topics, including the M and DAX languages.,This course may not be for you if you have a Mac, as Power BI is not natively installable onto Macs.