Book Review: Pro Power BI Architecture

I was pleased to see Reza Rad’s latest book Pro Power BI Architecture: Development, Deployment, Sharing, and Security for Microsoft Power BI Solutions: Rad, Reza: 9781484295373: Amazon.com: Books now out the door. Reza is an old friend, fellow Data Platform MVP, and fellow member of the Microsoft Regional Director program.

I was pleased to have been a technical reviewer for this book, and I hope that, along with the other reviewers, we have improved what was already a good book.

Not Just an Update

This is version 2 of the book that Reza produced in 2019 but it is not a book with minor updates. Most of the book is rewritten.

Reza is a book-writing machine. In this book, he has covered so very many aspects of architecture for Power BI. He has provided an emphasis on reliability and ease of maintenance. In particular, I was pleased to see a discussion on environments as that’s often omitted in Power BI related books. And a discussion on how to save money by using the right licensing. Once again, that’s a topic that’s often not discussed.

Target Audience and Style

The book is really for anyone who needs to build Power BI reports (often analysts and developers), but with a view to the bigger picture of how to structure a project so it continues to be usable as it (or the team) grows in size.

I like Reza’s conversational style and it shines out in his writing. When I read it, I often feel like I’m sitting in a room listening to him talk. That’s a tough skill and Reza does it effortlessly.

Summary

Great book and well-written

8 out of 10

2023-08-28