Power BI is a Business Intelligence facility that can help companies gain a competitive advantage. Power BI tools are components of this online data visualization and analytics platform that allow companies to analyze data quickly, identify trends and make intelligent decisions accordingly. Power BI architecture is the structure that the entire Power Bi concept stands on, and defines the way it has been designed and created. Understanding the architecture, and knowing the tools and services it offers, helps users create interactive dashboards, reports, and visualizations. It was developed by Microsoft and is used by companies across the globe. It’s a perfect way out for businesses wanting to improve their decision-making processes by gaining insights into their operations and accessing more accurate data than they have been able to access previously.
Table of Content:
- What is the Power Bi Architecture?
- What is a Power BI architecture diagram?
- What are the components of Power BI architecture?
- 5 FAQs
What is the Power BI architecture?
Power BI architecture is the framework that defines the working boundaries and relationships of the various components of Power Bi and its various services and tools. It lets users create data analysis systems that help synthesize data and visualize it in a useful manner and make it actionable. Power BI is a cloud-based data analytics platform that combines the power of Microsoft’s machine learning, cloud computing, and business intelligence capabilities to provide users with powerful and actionable analytical capabilities and insights from the data.
The architecture has several parts; the first part is the cloud-based Power Bi Service, which is the main engine where all the computations take place, in case one is using the open network. This is where the data is fed, the rules for operating on the data are fed and this is where the results are dispatched to the end-user, after data has been acted upon as per the fed rules. This is programmed to be so by the Power Bi Professional who directly connects to this service using the internet browser and database/s (on-premises/cloud-based) is/are connected using the Power Bi Gateway. The power bi Service has its own smaller architecture. The Power BI service architecture is a cloud-based collection of the Microsoft Power BI tools that allows content creators to create reports without needing technical knowledge or expensive software licenses. Power BI service architecture also provides powerful analytical capabilities like machine learning algorithms without requiring specialized programming skills to implement these features in other solutions like Tableau (which uses Python as its primary programming language). The Power BI service architecture runs on Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure and hosts all of your data to be accessed anywhere by users with access to the Power BI website or mobile app (available for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone 8/10). The Power BI service architecture also hosts dashboards created in Power BI Desktop to be viewed online. It is a complete solution in itself and can be accessed by anyone wanting to be part of a ‘fully online’ system. Its use is browser-based.
Unlike the browser-based online (cloud) version of things, the next part is the local part (on-premise) where the Power Bi Professional maintains the architecture on a computer. The interface that they use to access the entire framework is called the Power bi Report Server (using the Power Bi Desktop interface). The access to the Power Bi Report Server, which is a scaled-down version of the main Power Bi Service, provides the facilities for the programmer to do their job of using the Power Bi system effectively locally. In this case, the server is on-premise and not in the cloud. This is a closed system which need not be connected to the internet for public consumption but can certainly be connected for closed user access via the internet/intranet, and is mostly intended to provide service to a clearly defined boundary of audience. The designer decides what data is to be used, how it is to be acted upon, and what will be the output. The creation of the desired reporting structure and the various resultant visuals that will be presented to the end-user are planned, decided upon and rules set by the professional inside the confines of the shell that a closed system such as this Report Server represents. This is called using the Power-Bi architecture off-cloud in a way.
The third part is the data storage place: data can be stored on-premises and connected with the online system (Power Bi Service, the main engine). It can also be stored in the cloud and connected to the Power Bi system. The Power Bi Gateway comes into play here as it facilitates the interfacing of the databases with the main service. The Gateway is not required to be used in case one is using on-premises architecture. In such a case, it is simpler and less cumbersome to connect the database with the processing engine (the server) as both are part of a closed group.
What is a Power BI architecture diagram?
It is the pictorial representation of the Power Bi Architecture. The overall schematic of the architecture is depicted in the diagram below. It shows the relationship of the various parts of the entire concept, and how they are interrelated. It tells about the physical location boundaries (where each part is or can be located), how these parts talk to each other, what their action boundaries are, how they respond and what they respond with. The three parts explained above are depicted here with their various dataflows and directions of dataflow.
source: simplilearn.com
The power of Power BI architecture is its ability to integrate with other systems such as Salesforce and Microsoft Office 365. In addition, the Microsoft Power BI tools allow users to pull in data from multiple sources into a single dashboard, where they can get insights into their business at any given moment. As a result, companies can make improved decisions about their plans for marketing, sales, hiring, accounting, costs, and profits. They can also address customer care problems with correct, relevant, critical, and intelligent information at their fingertips.
What are the components of Power BI architecture?
With Power BI tools being the lifeline of the present business world, it becomes essential to study which components (also sometimes called power bi tools) together result in the successful building of this model through the Microsoft Power BI architecture. Given below are the components of Power BI architecture:
Data sources
Data sources are the origin of your data in the Power BI architecture diagram. The first step in creating a Power BI report is to connect it to some data source. This can be a database, an Excel spreadsheet, or something else. These can be structured and unstructured datasets stored in a variety of formats. You can use Power Query to connect to different data sources, including Excel files, SQL databases, Azure Blob storage, etc.
Power BI Desktop
Power BI Desktop is a Power BI tool that you’ll use to create reports, visualizations through Power BI Visualization tools, and dashboards from your data once data is imported into Power BI. It is part of the on-premise architecture. It is a part of the Power Bi Report Server (discussed next). It is an application that enables you to create reports and analysis tools based on your data sources. It allows you to connect with multiple data sources and create custom queries. You can generate reports and visualizations based on those queries as well. It’s similar to Excel in that it has a spreadsheet-like interface where you can drag and drop elements onto a canvas and format them using tools like colors and fonts.
Power BI report server
The next part of the on-premise Power BI architecture is called the report server—this is where your content lives once it’s been published online. You’ll see your work here after creating reports from scratch. This component allows you to create reports that can be shared with other users in your organization without worrying about security or confidentiality concerns. It keeps all of these sensitive details away from prying eyes.
Power BI gateway architecture
The Power BI gateway architecture is a construct that runs in the Azure cloud and provides an interface between your organization’s data sources and the Power BI service. It can connect to a broad spectrum of data sources, including SQL Server databases, Excel workbooks, and Hadoop clusters. Power BI gateway architecture also provides security for your Power BI environment by encrypting all traffic between it and your data sources.
Power BI Mobile
This is a mobile facility for viewing and interacting with dashboards. It’s available as an app for Android and iOS devices or as a browser-based app that can run from any device with a browser. You can also embed reports from the app into your website or other applications.
Power BI Embedded
This lets you embed Power BI dashboards in your applications or websites using HTML5, JavaScript, or React Native code snippets. It works on Windows 10 and Windows 10 Mobile devices and iOS devices running iOS 10 or later versions of iOS operating systems. In addition, it gives a more interactive experience for its users.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is Power BI architecture?
Power BI architecture is a system developed by Microsoft to help in data analysis, management, and its visualization for easy interpretation. It includes Power BI tools, which are the applications that make it possible for you to create reports, dashboards, and visualizations.
2. How do you add a diagram in Power BI?
There are two ways to add a diagram in Power BI with the help of Power BI visualization tools:
1. The foremost manner is to use the Report Canvas.
2. The second way is to drag fields from the right side to the visualization pane.
3. What are the three elements of Power BI designed?
Power BI tools have three main elements: Power BI Desktop, Power BI Service, and the Power BI Mobile app.
Power BI Desktop is a desktop application that you can use to build visualizations from your data. You can also publish these visualizations to a Power BI Service account, where they will be available for anyone with access to the account to view and interact with. The service also allows you to share reports with other organizations or individuals outside of your account and create dashboards with multiple visualizations based on different datasets.
Power BI Service stores all data connections, reports, dashboards, and datasets. Reports are stored in tiles and dashboards as pages that can be easily shared or embedded into other websites via embed codes or APIs. Data connections are made through Data Catalogs, where you can import from on-premises servers or public cloud services like Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Data Warehouse.
Power BI Mobile App for iOS and Android devices allows you to view dashboards from any location with an internet connection.
4. Is Power BI frontend or backend?
Microsoft Power BI tool can be used as a frontend and backend application. One may visualize data in various formats, including charts, tables, maps, sparklines, or custom objects. This means using it as a frontend. Using Power BI as a backend application means using it as a database for storing and managing information relevant to organizational processes.
5. Is Power BI a tool or software?
Power BI is a cloud-based software that requires you to log in to your account and use it online. Facilities in the Power bi framework, known as Power BI tools, are tools that are categorized in the ‘data visualization tools’ category. This means you can visualize your data in different ways and display it more appealingly.
