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Chris Webb

@cwebbbi.bsky.social
874 followers 393 following 122 posts

I work at Microsoft on the Fabric CAT team. Posts are my own.

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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Improvements to Power Query integration in Power BI Report Builder blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/09/27/i...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Improvements to Power Query integration in Power BI Report Builder
Connections are now easier to manage
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Find what changed and when in your #PowerBI semantic model blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/09/13/f...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Find what changed and when in your Power BI semantic model
Get the date and time that measures, columns and other objects were last changed
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
Choosing a #PowerBI storage model for reporting on data from Azure Databricks blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/09/06/c...
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Referencing images and other files in #PowerBI reports using OneLake URLs blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/08/30/r...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Referencing images and other files in Power BI reports using OneLake URLs
Storing images and other files in OneLake avoids the need for complex workarounds
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 23/08/2026
Tools with interactive UIs in Fabric notebooks with Semantic Link Labs blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/08/23/t...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Tools with interactive UIs in Fabric notebooks with Semantic Link Labs
UI based tools for Power BI developers in Fabric notebooks
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Displaying the output of Detail Rows Expressions in #PowerBI reports using the paginated report visual blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/08/16/d...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Displaying the output of Detail Rows Expressions in Power BI reports using the Paginated Report visual
Drill to detail for a measure in a Power BI report
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
Using Detail Rows Expressions to drill to a different fact table in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/08/09/u...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Using Detail Rows Expressions to drill to a different fact table in Power BI
Detail Rows Expressions can sometimes offer an alternative to user defined aggregations
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
Analysing #PowerBI data using Copilot in #Excel blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/08/02/a...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Analysing Power BI data using Copilot in Excel
Excel Copilot can now get data direct from Power BI semantic models
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
#PowerBI, M365 Copilot and the importance of DAX UDFs blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/07/26/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI, M365 Copilot and the importance of DAX UDFs
DAX UDFs can be used my M365 Copilot for complex data analysis
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
Using Fabric Operations Agents and Workspace Monitoring with #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/07/19/u...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Using Fabric Operations Agents and Workspace Monitoring with Power BI
A simple example of using an Operations Agent to watch for broken visuals in a Power BI report
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 12/07/2026
The benefits of using Direct Lake mode in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/07/12/t...
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 05/07/2026
Understanding the "Database was evicted to balance the CPU load" error in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 28/06/2026
Power BI DirectQuery mode: a better choice than you might think blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/06/28/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI DirectQuery mode: a better choice than you might think
Using DirectQuery on Fabric Warehouse or the SQL Endpoint of a Lakehouse is great for large data volumes
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 21/06/2026
New book: "Extreme DAX" 2nd edition blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/06/21/n...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
New book: "Extreme DAX" 2nd edition
The value of this new book lies it its worked examples of how to solve complex DAX problems
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 14/06/2026
Improve performance of staging in Fabric Dataflows Gen2 by disabling V-Order blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/06/14/i...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Improve performance of staging in Fabric Dataflows Gen2 by disabling V-Order
Disabling V-Order on staged data makes staging faster
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 07/06/2026
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 3: is more parallelism always good? blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/06/07/f...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 3: is more parallelism always good?
More parallelism does not always result in faster performance and can cause errors
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 31/05/2026
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 2: partitioned compute blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/05/31/f...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 2: partitioned compute
How to control concurrency within a dataflow when partitioned compute is used
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 24/05/2026
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 1 blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/05/24/f...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Fabric Dataflows Gen2 and concurrent evaluation, part 1
A simple example of how increasing concurrency can improve dataflow refresh performance
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 17/05/2026
The "You've exceeded the capacity limit for dataset refreshes" error in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/05/17/u...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
The "You've exceeded the capacity limit for dataset refreshes" error in Power BI
Refreshing too many semantic models at the same time on a capacity can cause this error
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 10/05/2026
Power BI semantic model memory errors, part 5: the "maximum allowable memory allocation" error blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/05/10/p...
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 03/05/2026
Connecting #PowerBI semantic models to data sources automatically with binding hints blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/05/03/c...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Connecting Power BI semantic models to data sources automatically with binding hints
Configure your semantic model so it connects to a Shareable Cloud Connection immediately after publishing
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Reposted by Chris Webb
Brent Ozar @brento.bsky.social · 29/04/2026
Thinking back about this topic again on the heels of coming back from SQLBits: Why Aren’t People Going to Local and Regional In-Person Events Anymore? www.brentozar.com/archive/2025...
brentozar.com
Why Aren't People Going to Local and Regional In-Person Events Anymore? - Brent Ozar Unlimited®
Steve Jones recently posted an update about SQL Saturday’s status, and it includes some news we need to talk about: However, this year the number may stagnate or even decline slightly. Running events…
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
Generating sample data in Fabric Dataflows with FabricAI.Prompt() blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/04/26/g...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Generating sample data in Fabric Dataflows with FabricAI.Prompt
The FabricAI.Prompt can be used to generate CSV data
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 25/04/2026
Back home from #sqlbits. There are other Microsoft data conferences but, after 20 years of attending, none of the others have had anything like the same impact on my life and my career. This year it was better than ever. As always, thanks to the organisers, helpers, speakers and sponsors!
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 19/04/2026
#PowerBI semantic model refresh warnings blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/04/19/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI semantic model refresh warnings
Power BI now shows warnings about broken measures and other items in its refresh history
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 12/04/2026
#PowerBI and support for third party semantic models blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/04/12/p...
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 05/04/2026
Role-playing dimensions in Fabric Direct Lake semantic models revisited blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/04/05/r...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Role-playing dimensions in Fabric Direct Lake semantic models revisited
A workaround to allow you to create multiple tables in a Direct Lake semantic model linked to the same table in OneLake
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 29/03/2026
Generating Excel reports with Fabric Dataflows Gen2 blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/03/29/g...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Generating Excel reports with Fabric Dataflows Gen2
Dataflows Gen2 can now generate Excel files with tables and charts
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Reposted by Chris Webb
European Microsoft Fabric + SQL Community Conference @fabconeurope.bsky.social · 28/03/2026
Interested in attending the European Microsoft Fabric + SQL Community Conference? Then book your ticket today to save €600! 📆 Sep 28 - 01 Oct 2026 📍CCIB, Barcelona, Spain 🎫 www.sharepointeurope.com/european-m… #MicrosoftFabric #MIcrosoftSQL
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 15/03/2026
When can Partitioned Compute help Fabric Dataflow performance? blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/03/15/w...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
When can Partitioned Compute help improve Fabric Dataflow performance?
Partitioned Compute lets you parallelise tasks inside a Dataflow
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
A closer look at Preview-Only steps in Fabric Dataflows blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/03/08/a...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Chris Webb's BI Blog: A Closer Look At Preview-Only Steps In Fabric Dataflows
I have been spending a lot of time recently investigating the new performance-related features that have rolled out in Fabric Dataflows over the last few months, so expect a lot of blog posts on th…
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 22/02/2026
#PowerBI, parallelism and dependencies between SQL queries in DirectQuery mode blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/02/22/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI, parallelism and dependencies between SQL queries in DirectQuery mode
How strict and eager evaluation can affect parallelism in DirectQuery mode
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 25/01/2026
Calculate(), DAX fusion and filters on 0 in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/01/25/c...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Calculate, DAX fusion and filters on 0 in Power BI
Filtering on 0 can be bad for performance if you're not careful
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 18/01/2026
Measuring time to display for image visuals in #PowerBI with Performance Analyzer blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/01/18/m...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Measuring the time to display image visuals in Power BI with Performance Analyzer
Large images can make reports slow
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 11/01/2026
Measuring geocoding performance in #PowerBI map visuals with Performance Analyzer blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/01/11/m...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Measuring geocoding performance in Power BI map visuals using Performance Analyzer
Geocoding could be making your report slow
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 04/01/2026
Diagnosing #PowerBI DirectQuery performance problems caused by SQL queries that return large resultsets blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2026/01/04/d...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Diagnosing Power BI DirectQuery performance problems caused by SQL queries that return large resultsets
Large resultsets can be slow to read
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 29/12/2025
Diagnosing #PowerBI DirectQuery connection limit problems with Performance Analyzer blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/12/28/d...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Diagnosing Power BI DirectQuery connection limit problems with Performance Analyzer
See when a DirectQuery report is slow because there are limited connections back to the source
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 21/12/2025
Visualising #PowerBI Performance Analyzer data with a vibe-coded custom visual blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/12/21/v...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Visualising Power BI Performance Analyzer data with a vibe-coded custom visual
How Performance Analyzer data exports can be visualised in Power BI using a custom visual
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 14/12/2025
#PowerBI Copilot and report filters and slicers blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/12/14/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI Copilot and report filters and slicers
How report filters and slicers influence how Copilot answers questions
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 07/12/2025
Stopping #PowerBI Copilot from answering questions from report visuals blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/12/07/s...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Stopping Power BI Copilot from answering questions from report visuals
AI Instructions can force Copilot to get answers from the semantic model instead of the report
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 01/12/2025
A look at the impact of calendar-based time intelligence on #PowerBI DirectQuery performance blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/11/30/a...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Impact of Calendar Based Time Intelligence on Power BI DirectQuery performance
Significant performance improvements are possible but not in all cases
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 23/11/2025
#PowerBI Build permissions and security blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/11/23/p...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Power BI, Build permissions and security
Build permissions are not security!
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 16/11/2025
Linking queries run from DAX Studio to Workspace Monitoring and the Capacity Metrics app blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/11/16/l...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Linking queries run from DAX Studio to Workspace Monitoring and the Capacity Metrics app
The RequestId value in DAX Studio's Server Timings is the same thing as the OperationId
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 09/11/2025
Calling DAX UDFs from #PowerBI Copilot blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/11/09/c...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Calling DAX UDFs from Power BI Copilot
An example showing how Copilot can call a DAX UDF that does ABC analysis
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 02/11/2025
Monitoring the DAX queries generated when the #PowerBI Copilot index is built blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/11/02/m...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Monitoring the DAX queries generated when the Power BI Copilot index is built
The DAX queries get all the distinct values less than 100 characters long from text columns
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 26/10/2025
Understanding the “Copilot analyzed only part of this model due to its size” warning in #PowerBI blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/10/26/u...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Understanding the "Copilot analyzed only part of the model due to its size" warning in Power BI Copilot
Learn how to control which columns Copilot indexes
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 19/10/2025
Monitor Fabric costs with Fabric Cost Analysis blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/10/19/m...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Monitor Fabric costs with Fabric Cost Analysis
It's a solution built using Fabric for monitoring Fabric costs
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 12/10/2025
First look at Fabric Graph: Analysing #PowerBI Import mode refresh job graphs blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/10/12/f...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
First look at Fabric Graph: Analysing Power BI Import mode refresh job graphs
Use Fabric's new graph database to analyse the jobs that make up a Power BI Import mode model refresh
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 05/10/2025
Snowflake query tags in #PowerBI and Workspace Monitoring blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/10/05/s...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Snowflake query tags in Power BI and Workspace Monitoring
Link a Snowflake query to the Power BI operation that generated it
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Chris Webb @cwebbbi.bsky.social · 28/09/2025
Linking Fabric Warehouse SQL queries and Spark jobs to the Capacity Metrics App blog.crossjoin.co.uk/2025/09/28/l...
blog.crossjoin.co.uk
Linking Fabric Warehouse SQL queries and Spark jobs to the Capacity Metrics App
The OperationId can be used to find details of a TSQL query or Spark job
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