Datamarts let you create reusable and auto-generated semantic models to create reports in various ways in Power BI. This article describes the various ways you can use datamarts, and their auto-generated semantic models, to create reports.
For example, you can establish a live connection to a shared semantic model in the Power BI service and create many different reports from the same semantic model. You can create your perfect data model in Power BI Desktop and publish it to the Power BI service. Then you and others can create multiple different reports in separate .pbix files from that common data model and save them to different workspaces.
Advanced users can build reports from a datamart using a composite model or using the SQL Endpoint.
Reports that use datamarts can be created in either of the following two tools:
Using the Power BI service
Using Power BI Desktop
Let's take a look at how datamarts can be used with each, in turn.
Create reports in the Power BI service
Scenario 1: From within the datamart experience, using the ribbon and the main home tab, navigate to the New report button. This provides a native, quick way to create reports.
Selecting New report opens a browser tab to the report editing canvas to a new report that is built on the semantic model. When you save your new report you're prompted to choose a workspace, provided you have write permissions for that workspace. If you don't have write permissions, or if you're a free user and the semantic model resides in a Premium-capacity workspace, the new report is saved in your My workspace.
Scenario 2: Using the auto-generated semantic model and action menu in the workspace: In the Power BI workspace, navigate to the auto-generated semantic model and select the More menu (...) to create a report in the Power BI service.
Selecting the More opens the report editing canvas to a new report that is built on the semantic model. When you save your new report, it's saved in the workspace that contains the semantic model as long as you have write permissions on that workspace. If you don't have write permissions, or if you're a free user and the semantic model resides in a Premium-capacity workspace, the new report is saved in your My workspace.
Scenario 3: Using the auto-generated semantic model and semantic model details page. In the Power BI workspace list, select the auto-generated semantic model's name to get to the semantic model details page, where you can find details about the semantic model and see related reports. You can also create a report directly from this page. To learn more about creating a report in this fashion, see semantic model details.
In the data hub, you'll see datamarts and their associated auto-generated semantic models. Select the datamart to navigate to the datamart's details page where you can see the datamart’s metadata, supported actions, lineage and impact analysis, along with related reports created from that datamart. Auto-generated semantic models derived from datamarts behave the same as any semantic model.
To find the datamart, you begin with the data hub. The image below shows the data hub in the Power BI service, with the following numbered information:
Select a datamart to view its datamart details page
Select the More menu (...) to display the options menu
Select Details to view details summary.
Create reports using Power BI Desktop
You can build reports from semantic models with Power BI Desktop using a Live connection to the semantic model. For information on how to make the connection, see connect to semantic models from Power BI Desktop.
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