Sessions and preconference at Microsoft Ignite and PASS Summit

In the second half of 2017 I will deliver sessions and preconference days in two big events. I’d like to recap my sessions here, let me know if you have any questions about them.

• Microsoft Ignite 2017 – September 25-29, 2017 – Orlando, FL
  • Preconference full day – September 24 – Scalable BI solutions for the IT Professional
    • This is a preconference about Azure Analysis Services, but 80% of the content is valid for Analysis Services Tabular 2016 or later, and another 15% is also valid for the new Analysis Services Tabular 2017. I am working with Christian Wade (MS) in the preparation of this preconference. The target audience is the larger IT and non-IT audience that is interested to scale a BI solution that started as a simple Power BI model. If you are an experienced user in Analysis Services Tabular, then this day could be interesting for you only for the new features. If you are new to Analysis Services and you want to understand its capabilities and the differences with Power BI, this is the right session for you.
  • Breakout 75 min – September 28 – DirectQuery in Analysis Services: Best practices, performance, use cases
    • If you want to understand what you can do and what you should not do with DirectQuery, you can join this session. I continue to see in many companies DirectQuery used as an alternative to VertiPaq (the In-Memory model, where you import a copy of the data). However, the proof-of-concept that worked well with a minimal set of rows, no longer provides good performance when the number grows. In reality, DirectQuery is an interesting solution for specific scenarios. You can learn how to get the most out of it once you understand how it works and how to avoid common mistakes in the implementation of your data model. This session will cover this topic in details, and you can also find additional content in the DirectQuery in Analysis Services 2016 whitepaper.
  • Community 45 min – September 28 – Toolkit for DAX optimization
    • I this short session I will show what are the tools that you must have to optimize DAX, and how to use them: VertiPaq Analyzer, SQL Profiler, OLAP PivotTable extension, and DAX Studio.
• PASS Summit 2017 – October 30 – November 3, 2017 – Seattle, WA
  • Preconference full day – October 30 – Data Modeling with Power BI
    • Before writing complex DAX expression, you should wonder whether you have the right data model in Power BI. When you design a model in the right way, usually you simplify the DAX code required, and sometime you might remove DAX measures at all! This full-day preconference is dedicated to those Power BI (and Power Pivot) users who do not have a data modeling background or experience. And if you are a DBA that wants to import in Power BI all the tables from a relational database in normalized in third-normal form… well, you should attend this preconference, too!
  • Breakout 75 min – DAX Best Practices
    • The title says it all. I know, usually I don’t like to give “best practices” because what is usually good in many scenarios… could be very bad in others! However, there are usually bad habits that you can avoid in DAX, improving the readability and the performance of your formulas. And sometime you can also avoid getting undesired results!
  • Breakout 75 min – DAX Optimization Example (by Alberto Ferrari)
    • This session will be delivered by Alberto Ferrari – yes, we will be both at the same conference! In this case, the idea is to show common optimization techniques for DAX. We will avoid overlapping content and examples between our sessions, so you will have a good reason to attend both.