The Bit Bucket

Dashboards are an effective way to visualize data, but not every use case involves a person watching a screen.

In many organizations, the most valuable insights come when real-time intelligence is embedded directly into operational systems.

Microsoft Fabric makes this possible by allowing you to expose query results as APIs — typically REST endpoints built on top of KQL Databases. This means that the same data you’re using in dashboards can also be made available to web or mobile applications, business workflows, or partner integrations.

2026-07-12

I recently received a review copy of The New Quantum Era: An Outsider’s Introduction by Sebastian Hassinger from my friends at PackT.

Author

Sebastian Hassinger has held key positions at Apple, IBM, and AWS. He is now an independent consultant and advisor. You can find him on The New Quantum Era podcast.

Content

This is a rare kind of technology book: ambitious, historically grounded, technically serious, and still readable for people who do not have a physics degree. And Sebastian is well placed to write it. He’s had both insider access and outsider sympathy.

2026-07-11

In the past, if you wanted a real-time Power BI dashboard, you had to use streaming datasets — data pushed directly into Power BI from an external source.

While that approach worked, it came with significant limitations: the data couldn’t easily be joined with historical information, retention was limited, and managing the push model was complex.

That model is now deprecated — streaming datasets shouldn’t be used for new solutions.

2026-07-10

I work with data. I understand that for most organizations, that the data they own is the most valuable asset the company owns.

One thing I’ve learned from working with data is that unlike application software, data generally outlives generations of applications, is often used by many different applications, and typically just morphs from shape to shape over time. It almost never gets totally refreshed.

This is a good thing.

2026-07-09

More SQL love !

Recently at Microsoft Build, Azure HorizonDB was announced. And we’ve just completed our first course using it.

Creating reports, analytics, or applications? And need to get data out of Azure HorizonDB? Learn to write SQL queries like a pro !

We have very popular SQL courses, for T-SQL, PostgreSQL, Snowflake, Oracle, DB2, and MySQL. We’ve just added our new course Writing SQL Queries for Azure HorizonDB and you can enrol in it now. It’s just $95 USD.

2026-07-09

Thresholds are great for simple conditions — but they fall short when what’s normal changes throughout the day, week, or season. That’s where anomaly detection comes in.

Instead of relying on fixed limits, anomaly detection uses statistical and machine learning techniques to model what’s normal for a given signal, then flag data points that deviate from that pattern.

For example, network traffic might be high during business hours but low overnight — a single static threshold would either miss issues or trigger constant false alarms. Anomaly detection adjusts dynamically, recognizing these natural variations in the data.

2026-07-08

Memory is a precious resource on most systems today. SQL Server loves memory, so it’s important to avoid wasting it.

One common cause of wasted memory is what we call plan cache pollution. The plan cache is the region where SQL Server stores compiled query plans (and query plan stubs).

There are some nice new DMVs that give you details of what’s in that cache but nothing still compares to one of the older compatibility views sys.syscacheobjects. You can use it to see what’s in your plan cache:

2026-07-07

In real-time analytics, thresholds are the simplest way to detect when something goes outside of normal operating conditions.

A threshold is just a fixed value or condition applied to a metric. For example, you might set a rule to flag when CPU usage stays above 90% for more than five minutes, or when transaction latency exceeds two seconds.

In Fabric Real-Time Intelligence, thresholds are typically implemented within KQL queries or dashboard visuals — for instance, using conditional formatting to highlight values above a certain limit, or defining an analytic rule to monitor a KPI in real time.

2026-07-06

I spend most of my life in a variety of customer sites. Most of these nowadays tend to be large financial organizations. When I talk to developers in those organizations, and ask them about how they interact with their DBAs, I can’t tell you how often I hear that they try to avoid ever making schema changes, etc. as it takes too long and the process is painful.

When I talk to the DBAs at the same organizations, and I ask them why they resist making schema changes, I hear this:

2026-07-05

In recent posts, I’ve focused on dashboards and visualizations — but real-time intelligence goes beyond that. The real power comes when your system doesn’t just display insights but can act on them automatically.

Dashboards are great for monitoring, but most people can’t sit and watch a dashboard all day. Instead, we can use alerts and automation to make the data work for us.

There are a few ways to do this in Microsoft Fabric and the broader Power Platform: Power BI Alerts can be set up on tiles or visuals. They monitor thresholds — like sales dropping below a target — and notify users when conditions are met.

2026-07-04