Microsoft Convergence is back

-
 It has been over 10 years since Microsoft hosted their Convergence conference for Microsoft business applications.  It is happening in Miami, FL on December 10th & 11th.  I am lucky to be attending and also presenting a session.  My session will be Using Power Platform to automate the accounting department in Dynamics 365 Finance.  Hopefully you will be attending and have an opportunity to join my session. I am posting my slides here, so if you attend and want the slides, you can get them here.  Using Power Platform slides   Even if you are unable to make the session, feel free to download my slides.
Post a Comment

Column from Examples - Power BI

-
In the April 2017 release of Power BI, Microsoft introduced a great new function.  Have you every been working with your data, and you know exactly what you want a calculated column to look like, but your are not exactly sure of the syntax for the formula?  Maybe you want to concatenate a couple columns, or you want to trim a column or even add some text to a column, well Column by Examples makes this very easy to do.

 You can access this function in the Query Editor on the Add Column tab.

In my sample data there are three columns (birthCountry, birthState and birthCity).  I would like to simply have a new column for Birth Place.  In order to do this, I could add a custom column and write the M formula to define this column.  However I am not sure what the exact syntax should be, so I can simply choose Column From Examples - From All Columns.

This creates a new column in the preview mode.  I can then simply type the result I am looking for in the first row.  "Denver, CO USA" - Power BI interprets that I am trying to concatenate the three columns with a comma between City and State and when I tab off the field it quickly shows me a preview of the remaining rows.  If I simply click OK, the column is added as an additional step in the Query Editor.  

In this example, Power BI created the following formula - 

= Table.AddColumn(#"Merged Columns", "Combined", each Text.Combine({[birthCity], ", ", [birthState], " ", [birthCountry]}), type text)

Column From Examples also works with dates.  In my example there are three columns for the birth date.  (birthYear, birthMonth & birthDay).  Again I can simply select Column From Examples - From All Columns.  In the newly created columns I will type in 12/27/1981 and when I tab off, Power BI will create the BirthDate column for me using the following formula:

 = Table.AddColumn(#"Column From Examples", "Combined (2)", each 
Text.Combine({Text.From([birthMonth]), "/", Text.From([birthDay]), "/", Text.From([birthYear])}), type text)

These are just a couple simple examples, and it is my understanding that Column From Examples does not work for everything, but so far I have had a lot of success using it and it is certainly faster than typing in the formulas myself.

 For more information on this formula take a look at the Power BI documentation.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

RPA with Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain

-
Image
Are you looking for ways to automate some of your routine accounting functions, like reconciling sub ledgers to the general ledger?   Microsoft has recently created some examples using Power Automate Desktop (think of it like Task Recording on steroids). It can not only automate steps through Dynamics 365, but it can also automate Excel and other applications. In one example from Microsoft they automate the AR to GL reconciliation: Automatic running of the AR aging and the customer/ledger reconciliation reports. Power Automate then extracts data from both reports in Excel and compares the balances. Power Automate then posts a Team message letting you know the subledger is in balance. Power Automate saves the reports with the date in the file name, so there is backup. Microsoft Directions & Example   I working with the example, I needed to make a couple of adjustments to the sample flow that was provided but I was able to get it to work. Here is a video of the flow r...
Read more

Using Full Page Apps in Dynamics 365 Finance

-
Image
Have you ever wanted to put a website or a model-driven Power App in one of your existing Dynamics 365 Finance workspaces or forms?  You might already know you can create a new workspace with a website, but did you know you can add the website to an existing workspace? Here is an example of the Vendor invoice entry workspace with the Invoice Capture Power App embedded. Prior to using this feature, you need to turn on "Saved views support for workspaces" in feature management. Once this feature is enabled you can follow the following steps to add the Invoice Capture app or any model-driven Power App or website to an existing workspace. Open the vendor invoice entry workspace From Options - choose Personalize this page From personalize menu - select the 3 dots - and then Add an app Once that is selected (the screen goes gray) - click on the section header where you want to add the app (in my example I put it in Links) On the Add an app menu - choose Website Give it a name (my e...
Read more

Copilot Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply

-
Image
Microsoft has recently released two Copilot applications to work with Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain. These solutions are still in preview, so it should only be uses in sandbox environments to evaluate and learn how they will work with your organization. Prior to installing it is important to make sure your environment meets the requirements. Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain requires the latest hotfix on Dynamics 365 Finance version 10.0.34 (10.0.1591.107) and version 10.0.35 (10.0.1627.70) and later. In addition, the solutions rely on the Power Platform and Dataverse, so it is important to have the environments connected and user security set appropriately. For more details on the prerequisites and the installation instructions you can follow the Microsoft installation documents. Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Let's look at what these two copilots provide to users Copilot in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance C...
Read more