If you’ve thought that, when you start using PowerPivot, will get rid of array lookup functions you were deadly wrong! Although the concept of a data model does not go hand in hand with the need to use these class of functions, it is sometimes necessary to search the arrays. To do this you will use the LOOKUPVALUE function, and how to use it, in combination with the WEEKDAY function, you will find out in the text that follows.
Recent versions of Power Pivot possess the feature that automatically generates hierarchies and columns that calculate year, quarter, and month for date columns. It is automatically activated when you drag such column into a Power Pivot report. This can be of use, but it can also bother you. In the following text you will find out how you can turn on or off this Excel feature.
Slicers are graphic objects that are used as an interactive filters for filtering reports in Pivot and Power Pivot reports. In combination with certain DAX functions they can be used for setting the parameters of the calculation. The following recipe will show you how to do a sales report in which, according to chosen exchange rate, you can see results in different currencies. To test a status of a slicer will be used function HASONEVALUE.
DAX has lots of useful Time Intelligence functions and in this recipe I will pay some attention to these that filter aggregations according to beginning or the end of a period. My friends from ASEE would say: “From the cradle to the grave is the most beautiful is go-go phase”. However, in this recipe I would hold to quantitative results, and DAX helps us to determine them in the easy way (that’s my field of expertise)!
Reports often require that in addition to the usual review of the sales we create running total, i.e. to track cumulative growth of sales from beginning of the month, quarter or year. For this purpose we use the Time Intelligence functions DATESMTD, DATESQTD and DATESYTD by which we can track cumulative sales growth since the beginning of the given period. If you want to find out more please read the recipe that follows…