Thread: Tabular Editor

[BrianJ]

@Heather, @marcster_uk, et al.,

Thanks to @JarrettM for sending me this. Pretty strong indication that Microsoft has fixed the metadata format bugs discussed above:

• Brian

[JarrettM]

Here is a nice source that I picked up today on Tabular Editor.

Power-BI-Sessions/An Introduction to Tabular Editor at master ·...

Enjoy
Jarrett

[Heather]

@BrianJ okay - I’m sold, I have now turned on the “Store dataset using enhanced metadata format” option, and used Tabular Editor to save me at least half a day (if not more) worth of work.

The other day we had a power outage while i was working on a new model, and PowerBi shut down on me without giving me time to save anything. I wasn’t too worried, normally I’m able to restart the program and work from the retrieved copy that wasn’t saved. But this time, something happened to muck up the data model - and I could not get the data to refresh (kept erroring out in different ways).

So, I opened the last saved version, which had the data model correct, but none of my measures. Then I found a blog post from ExceleratorBI (there are probably dozens of others), talking about copying measures from one model to another using Tabular editor launched in the desktop.

I’m a believer now - just need to learn more that I can do with Tabular.
58 measures copied in less than 5 minutes, even the display folders I was using!

Copy Measures Between 2 Power BI PBIX Files

[BrianJ]

@Heather,

That’s awesome – I saw that article from Matt Allington yesterday, but hadn’t tried it yet. I am totally sold on Tabular Editor but I do miss IntelliSense. According to Daniel, he’s working on incorporating that now and it’s the second item listed on his development roadmap:

-Brian

Home

[marcster_uk]

Tabular Editor Version 3… it’s coming, with new features…

REPLAY Power BI tips from the Pros - LIVE w/ Marco Russo (Aug 22, 2020)

[marcster_uk]

Tabular Editor 3 (with Daniel Otykier)

Tabular Editor 3 is not yet released, but you can sign up for the preview

Tabular Editor 3 will be a commercial product

https://tabulareditor.com/

[BrianJ]

@BrianJ

All,

After my initial giddiness subsided, I realized that the bus dropped us off one stop short of utopia. Tabular Editor currently does not include IntelliSense, although the developer did indicate that feature is currently on his list of future enhancements and capabilities to add.

– Brian

This is what I wrote back in July 2020 after the External Tools menu was introduced and I started playing with Tabular Editor. Well, likely within the next few weeks as Tabular Editor 3 becomes publicly available, I’m happy to report that the bus now goes all the way to utopia. This is the DAX development environment we’ve all been waiting for, and much more. Not only is Intellisense now included, it’s a much better implementation of it than in PBI. Here’s my detailed preview of TE3, based on 3+ months of beta testing. And pairing it with Analyst Hub makes both tools even stronger. As I say in the video preview below, one day soon we are going to wake up and find that Power BI’s worst feature (the nearly featureless DAX editing environment) has suddenly become its best…

Tabular Editor 3 Will Change The Way You Power BI

And here is a very interesting article today from SQLBi about the importance of external tools in the current Power BI development environment:

Development tools for Tabular models in 2021 - SQLBI

• Brian

[BrianJ]

All,

Big news for TE fans - Microsoft releases v 1.1 of Best Practices Analyzer rule set.

Best practice rules to improve your model’s performance and design v1.1

Link to rule set JSON file and C# loading script:

Analysis-Services/BestPracticeRules at master · microsoft/Analysis-Services

• Brian

[BrianJ]

All,

For those of you who have switched over to Tabular Editor 3 (and I highly recommend every intermediate and advanced Power BI user give it a free 30 day trial at tabulareditor.com. Note: I have no affiliation with Tabular Editor, I just think it’s awesome), here are some useful learning resources:

Tabular Editor 3 (with Daniel Otykier)

Tabular Editor 3 Will Change The Way You Power BI

REPLAY Tabular Editor 3 & Power BI Q&A - LIVE w/ Daniel Otykier & Marco Russo (June 12, 2021)

5 Productivity Benefits of Tabular Editor 3

Top features in Tabular Editor 3 to boost your Power BI development! - Data...

Tabular Editor 3 - My Favorite Features

How to Automate Tabular Editor 3 With Scripts To Simplify Repetitive Tasks

In addition, our own version of the Definitive Guide to DAX, @AntrikshSharma , will be developing an in-depth portal course on TE3 targeted for later this Summer.

Finally, @alexbadiu and I have been posting useful C# scripts for TE3 to the Analyst Hub (just search “Tabular” to find). My video above on TE3 scripting shows you how to make use of these script snippets.

Others, please add to this thread as you find additional useful training resources.

Thanks.

• Brian

[BrianJ]

TE3 Fans,

In my video above on scripting, I’m kicking myself that I forgot to show you one of the most useful TE3 scripts.

If you load the code below into a new TE3 script, with three clicks you can automatically format every single measure in your report (!!!). I’ve done it in reports with over 100 measures and it’s still nearly instantaneous.

No reason now to ever look at another unformatted DAX measure.

• Brian

[svada]

Hi,
Thanks for the video. It is very helpful. I am having an issue with formatting:

Format String Expression is not working when I try to set it. Showing me the following error.

So, instead I added FORMAT() function in the calculation item code to make it work. Is there a way to resolve this issue.

[Keith]

i think i would delete this posting has you created a new posting for it.

thanks
Keith

[svada]

Ya sure Keith. I created a new post.