Power BI Dynamic Measures & Dimensions

Power BI Dynamic Measures & Dimensions – Part 1

A great way to take your Power BI Reports to the next level is by making them fully interactive by incorporating PowerBI dynamic measures & dimensions. With this clever use of DAX, it’s possible to slice your data the way you want without leaving the dashboard screen.

In this 2-part series we’ll look at creating dynamic measures & dimensions within your PowerBI reports in part 1 and then continuing that into visual titles in part 2.

Using this concept greatly enhances the end user experience as they can monitor/analyse multiple measures and dimensions in a single report page at the click of a button making this a highly desirable solution.

In the PowerBI report example below, we have a financial dataset which includes revenue, expenses & taxes and from these we can calculate profit. We have created 1 set of measures for profit, revenue, expenses & taxes and 1 dimension for the time periods Fiscal Year to Date (FYTD), Quarter to Date (QTD) and Month to Date (MTD).

This will allow end users to view, as seen in the examples below, Profit by FYTD or QTD or MTD as well as the variances to the previous FYTD or QTD or MTD and all the visuals and visual titles will update when a different measure or time period is selected.

Profit FYTD

Profit QTD

Profit MTD

How to

There are quite a few steps involved to get this concept up & running but the benefits to your report consumers will be well worth the effort.

1. Create the base measure for Profit, then create the Time Intelligence measures for the current periods, Profit FYTD, Profit QTD & Profit MTD and then create the measures for the previous periods, Profit PFYTD, Profit PQ QTD, Profit PM MTD and repeat this process for Revenue, Expenses & Taxes.

2. Create 2 new tables, one for measure selection, this allows end users to select from Profit, Revenue, Expenses & Taxes measures, and one for time selection, this allows end users to select from FTYD, QTD & MTD time periods.

Dynamic Measures table

Dynamic Dimensions table

3. Create the base measure for the Measure Selection and Time Selection These 2 measures utilise the SELECTEDVALUE DAX function, becoming the foundation for the dynamic measures we create for the visuals within the report page.

Below is the Time Selected measure.

4. Next we create the Selection 1 and Selection 2 These 2 measures utilise the SWITCH DAX function. Selection 1 is for the current period measures FYTD, QTD & MTD and Selection 2 is for the previous period measures PY FYTD, PQ QTD and PM MTD. Below is the Selection 1 measure.

5. Finally, we create the variance measures between Selection 1 & Selection 2 allowing us the show the variances by $ value and % value between the selected time periods i.e. variance between FYTD and PY FYTD as seen below.

Bringing it all together

Using your preferred slicer, in this example the Chiclet Slicer (available via the PowerBI Marketplace), we create 2 slicers, one for the Selected Measure and one for Selected Time. These slicers allow your report consumers to dynamically change measures & time periods within the report page.

Below is the Selected Measure Chiclet Slicer.

With all the setup now complete, we create the visuals for the report page using either or both the Selection 1 and Selection 2 measures and you’re done!

Summary

If you’d like to take your PowerBI Reports and Dashboards to the next level and need help, please contact us to discuss how we can assist your organisation.