Power Pivot and Power BI: The Excel User's Guide to DAX, Power Query, Power BI & Power Pivot in Excel 2010-2016 Second edition

I have read the "first half" of this book at least 6 times now! Every time I read it, I got a little farther in my understanding and ability to use the concepts in my everyday work. Just today, after owning the book for almost 2 1/2 years and using it repeatedly as a reference guide, I finished the entire book with full understanding. Learning how to write DAX in Power Pivot has transformed my work, and this book has been my steady number one go-to reference among several books on Power BI that I have ordered over 2 1/2 years.I decided to write a review today, because I want to share how important it is to take this in small pieces, and really use the power of self-discovery for many of the lessons in Rob and Avi's book. The book is very well written, in easy conversational tone, yet some of the concepts are very hard to grasp, and require lots of hands-on absorption to really understand. I now have a solid 2 1/2 years of intensive hands-on data modelling in Power Pivot under my belt. I have attended public classes, worked with a consultant on a big Power BI project, watched many you-tube videos, read and written blogs, and I even host a couple of Power BI user groups at my office. And yet STILL today, as I read all the way to the end of the book with full understanding for the first time, I caught some new concepts and had to think about it and absorb. This is a both a book for beginners, and it is a book for advanced users to absorb over time. I can't recommend it highly enough.

The first thing you notice about the hardcopy book is the very high quality of the pages and the colors in the illustrations. The book is actually heavy - probably because of all the ink that is in it. In my 40 years as an engineer and student I don't recall ever having a technical book that was so pleasant to hold and read. The content is the highest quality too. I covers the basics of the data model to calculated columns and measures. It covers cube formulas, time intelligence and advanced features such as variables. It covers Power Query well; but leaves plenty of room to justify reading M is for Data Monkey by Puls and Escobar. Collie and Singh provide a good explanation of the relationship between Power Pivot and the Microsoft BI platform and SSAS Tabular. The book covers well the DAX programming language including new functions for 2016. The book would be complete if it covered DAX as a query language too. I highly recommend this book because it is very example-driven and practical. It is a great complement to Ferrari and Russo's Building Data Models with Power Pivot which heavier on theory. Both these books, amd M if for Data Monkey are what you would use to help you design and build complex business inteligence systems.

I have years experience working with Excel pivot tables and using Microsoft Access databases as a backend. I just recently got a copy of Excel 2016 and wanted something to help me get started with PowerPivot and the DAX engine. The UI and terminology is just different enough I didn't want to slog through it myself.This book has been perfect in that respect. It starts off assuming you have a good working knowledge of things like tables, relationships, pivot tables, and databases in general, and then shows you how to plug the DAX engine into all of that. This is not a book for Excel Pivot Table beginners, but a book for DAX/PowerPivot beginners.I disagree with some of the reviewers that the book needs an editor. I've personally not found that to be the case. I found the writing style engaging, with complex subjects approached from different angles.One issue I have with the book, and the reason I gave it 4 stars instead of 5, is the content that comes with it. The book has no files or CD inside, but it has a link to a ZIP file on their web site with all sorts examples. The problem is everything is done. So when you open up the workbook for CHAPTER 6, there is nothing to do but look at it. I found myself deleting a bunch of stuff, which is tedious as you cannot bulk-delete Measures in PowerPivot.As much of the book seems to build not only in concept through each chapter, but also with the data model, I went back and grabbed the CHAPTER 4 workbook. This is where the meat of the book really starts. I am working back through to chapter 9 (my current position in the book) and building the Measures, Calculated Columns, etc. which is a much better learning experience for me instead of just looking at formulas in the book and confirming that those are the same formulas in the finished workbooks.I would really like to give it better than 4 stars, but since it is a book designed to teach, it should be really good at it. The fully completed examples simply fail to teach.That said, I wholeheartedly recommend this book. I am glad it was my first choice.

This is an excellent book to get you excited about the Microsoft family of Power Business Intelligence products. They provide a nice overview of where this set of products fits into the Microsoft scheme, why this is a very important and trending set of tools to know, and the text gets you very excited to learn more. The writing style is fun and easy and you will find yourself excited to learn more. They provide numerous examples to illustrate concepts and power, and the style of writing is wonderful for this topic. They take an approach from broad overview to beginning commands and usage and then they step you right into very powerful features. I agree with other reviewers that state that you will find yourself going back to this book again and again to re-read and uncover subtleties that you missed the first time. It is just that MS Power Pivot (Excel and Power BI, with DAX) is a very new and powerful way to create looks at data. This is a great book to buy. The topic is complicated enough that you will want to buy more books to get a different perspective. But, this book is good for all levels and I found it a good place to start.

Amazing book. Your probably scanning amazon wondering what book to buy, just get this one. The first 162 pages are worth memorizing. The rest is good but a little specialized.