Share your thoughts on visual calculations (preview)

[jeroenterheerdt]

Hit "Reply" and let us know what you think of visual calculations! To learn more about this feature, please visit the blog post or our documentation.

Here are some areas that we'd like to hear about in particular:

• errors / issues you are experiencing
• functionality that is missing / does not work as you expected that is not listed as limitations in our documentation.
• suggestions on governance capabilities
• sorting behavior of visual and visual matrix

Thanks and we look forward to hearing your feedback!

[tara-erzi]

Thank you for your response.

I am currently using Facet Key and having several issues with it. While I found the solution to a similar problem helpful and managed to resolve the coloring issue, the colors still don't match my dashboard. I noticed that Facet Key has the capability to change colors based on category. 

[jeroenterheerdt]

ah thank you, the facet key is a custom visual so these will have formatting limitations or do things differently compared to built-in visuals.

[Chita]

Hey! It's really a great feature. I think it would be more helpful if we can filter these new visual calculation columns in visual filter panel. 

[jeroenterheerdt]

agreed - filtering on visual calculations is not yet possible and a documented limitation.

[Schrage]

Really appreciate this option. Smashing the like-button. Two items that would be super helpful: 

• Conditional Formatting (looks like you are already tracking that)
• A way to view the underlying low-level functions so it makes it easy to add to the model. I have a difficult time contextualizing the context in which I want to view things - being able to create a visual using these simple ones would go a long way to helping me execute more efficiently. 

Thanks again - I appreciated your YouTube video!

[jeroenterheerdt]

thank you - can you elaborate a little bit more on the second point maybe? Am I correct in understanding you'd like to see a way for you to see the window function (such as window/offset/index) you'd invoke if you'd wrote the visual calculation as a measure?

[Schrage]

Correct, it may not be feasible, but I'll give an example:

• I have a YoY chart calculating sales by Fiscal Year. Using the SAMEPERIOD function in a measure on the same table, I get slightly different numbers because our fiscal years don't align YoY. 
• I know there are probably ways to solve for this more efficiently, but I don't own the datasources I am working from and contextually I am a bit lost when it comes to defining the context for the measure I want to see.  
• In the new visual calculation, I see exactly what I want to see (albeit without conditional formatting yet!).  If I could understand the context around what is happening to get to those numbers, or better yet, a "suggested measure" I could use that measure as an example measure to populate other visuals.

I am a bit of a novice, but I imagine more and more of your users are in a similar boat converting from Excel and trying to contextualize their visuals.  Regardless, this new feature is helpful!

[BigRob]

have you tried using the Performance Analyzer ? this could be an additional feature that breaks down the visual calculation elements as well as the underlying dax.  

[jeroenterheerdt]

ok, thanks for clarifying. We are thinking about how allow you to "promote" your visual calculation to a model measure, so hopefully that will cover what you are after.

[BigRob]

looks like it will be a great feature and would make a lot of my reports much simpler but is there any plan to release it for the on premise report server version ?  

[jeroenterheerdt]

It's really dependent on the source you're using - if you are using Analysis Services on premises then it will take a long time for it to be ready there. But eventually, yes, it should be available for report server as well.

[jeroenterheerdt]

Tagging everyone who has specifically mentioned format strings in their feedback - please send me a DM with your email address. I'd like to set up a focus group to discuss our options. If you're interested in this and I didn't tag you, send me a DM as well 🙂

@NicEdmonds, @MalinaCS, @pcourtemanche , @zbWorkProfile , @Pim_7890 

[NicEdmonds]

I think this will eventually be a great feature, however I don't see this as very usable at the moment.  The fact that you can't format the calculations, e.g. you give the ability to use template for % of total, but not able to format that instictively as a percentage. Yes I use FORMAT, however that sort of defeats the purpose if it is text.  Also conditional formatting will be essential to make this a truly powerful feature.  

[jeroenterheerdt]

thank you, these are both on the limitations list and currently being worked on to support.

[MalinaCS]

I totally agree: formatting is crucial.

P.S. Thank you fo this awesome feature! 

[PawelHalamoda]

Unfortunately, I am not able to turn on this functionality. Of course, I included this feature in preview features, but after restarting the application, it still does not work. Reinstallation, as suggested by Microsoft technical support, also does not work.

[jeroenterheerdt]

sorry to hear you're having issues. Are you seeing any error messages? The "new calculation" button should show up on the Home ribbon after activation, it's not on the Modeling tab. Also, there should be a "new calculation" option in the menu that shows on right-click on a visual.

If you can't find it after activating, can you please send a screenshot of your home ribbon as well as a screenshot of the about dialog?

[sourica]

Nice job !!

I test this functionnality.

I'd like to use the calculated column into X or Y or category fields in visuals.

For example, I tested this functionnality to simplify a long list of categories.

I wanted to display the 3 main categories + 1 category "OTHERS" in a pie chart.

I suceeded in creating my new category column, but I can't place it in the X column of my bar chart.

[jeroenterheerdt]

hi, thanks for trying this - you can't use visual calculations on the X axis of your bar chart. Is that something you'd want us to enable?

[zbWorkProfile]

Being able to manually designate an axis would be hugely helpful. In my (limited) experience testing visual calculations---working with RUNNINGSUM---not being able to change which axis the calculation runs on presents challenges. Also need that axis to be measure-friendly; I work with a lot of datasets that don't easily allow for indexing/ranking in Power Query or as a calculated column (requiring it instead to be done by measure), and I need to be able to take RUNNINGSUM through that calculated index/rank.

[jeroenterheerdt]

not sure I understand - you can write COLUMNS or ROWS in the axis parameter to switch to the other axis if it's available on your visual. Is that the "axis" you are referring to ?