SQLBI Newsletter #331

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NEW ARTICLE

Understanding DAX contracts when using AI

Defining the right contract is a key activity for a DAX developer using AI. In this article, we introduce the concept of a contract through simple examples.
Read more

COMICS

AI BI Blunders

This comic has been generated by Grok and ChatGPT using so many prompts...

CLASSROOM COURSES IN 2026

Attend the new in-person Mastering DAX

We are only offering five Mastering DAX classroom courses until the end of 2026, so make sure to get your seat:

North America & United Kingdom

Europe

We continue to update our in-person training with the latest news, new exercises, and you will get full access to the video course as soon as your seat is confirmed!

#331 · Oct 2026

LEARNING

Course calendar

Mastering DAX - 3 DAYS

	Oct 12-14 - Warsaw
	Oct 27-29 - Lugano
	Nov 9-11 - Atlanta
	Nov 24-26 - London
	Dec 1-3 - Amsterdam

DAX with AI

	AI for Power BI: Intro
	DAX with AI: Essentials
	DAX with AI: Scenarios

video courses

	Introducing DAX
	Mastering DAX
	Optimizing DAX
	Intro to Data Modeling
	Data Modeling for Power BI
	Mastering Tabular
	DAX Tools Video Course
	DAX Patterns
	Power BI Dashboard Design

See sharp. Think spatial. - Synoptic Panel for Power BI by OKVIZ

BI-WEEKLY NEWS DIGEST

Latest news

	• Power BI September 2026 updates At conferences like Fabcon, many new features are released. Beyond what other news may cover, the introduction of Approximate Distinct Count for Import and Direct Lake is likely a game-changer for models that struggle with measures that rely on distinct-count calculations. We also added sting indexing, full-text search, and increased the export-to-Excel row limit to 500,000 rows instead of 150,000. Yeah, the latter is what matters more; we know. Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• Power BI’s next chapter: the app for Power BI Desktop and Pro subscriptions Microsoft announced that the ability to create apps in Fabric (basically, websites that access your semantic models and other Fabric resources) will be available in Power BI Desktop and extended to Power BI Pro users. We do not think this is going to remove the reports we have today. However, as is always the case with a new feature, the buzz is now that everything will become an app. We'll see. However, this is big news. Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• Power BI Authoring MCP Server 1.0 The Power BI Authoring MCP Server is the generally available release of the formerly known Power BI Modeling MCP Server. We expect that with this name, we'll also edit reports, but not in this release; for that, you'll need other skills to work with the PBIP files. Naming is never easy with Microsoft products. Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• The new Copilot Code will work with MCP Server Yes, you will be able to use Copilot to edit the model in Power BI Desktop. Just wait for the new release described here. Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• Semantic model best practices for data agent Long story short: to get the best from a data agent, design a semantic model as you would for humans. You weren't doing that? Well, now you have to. Yes, those Dim and Fact prefixes, for example. You knew this day would come. Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• Manage semantic model settings in the settings pane in Power BI The actual news is that you will be able to assign a bitmap to a semantic model. The feature is in preview and is still not widely available Sep 30, 2026 · Microsoft
	• HTML Content 2.0 Secure (and certified) The custom visual HTML Content now has a Power BI Certified version that applies limitations to what you can do, but it is certified, and this is certainly welcome news in many companies. Sep 29, 2026 · Daniel Marsh-Patrick
	• F0 capacity is pay-per-use, no committment In several Fabcon announcements, the upcoming F0 capacity will enable access to Fabric features without commitment, on a pay-per-use model. We are missing many details (price? available memory/CPU?), but this is clearly important news for many small companies and consultants. Sep 30, 2026 · MIcrosoft
	• Yet another semantic model open source standard The new buzz is to create open source standards for semantic models. Snowflake and Microsoft are involved in this one, where DAX is included as a dialect of formula languages supported. We are not sure that ANSI_SQL, MDX, DAX, and Tableau calculations are dialects of the same language. Will this standard survive the buzz? We'll see. Sep 30, 2026 · Snowflake

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