Atlas and Power BI: The Powerful Collaboration You Need Now

These days when we hear about business intelligence (BI) and reporting, the conversation is all about Microsoft Power BI. Not only is it a great app, but its desktop version is also free. So, you’d be foolish not to take advantage of its capabilities, right? Right! But you do need to be aware that there are some complexities when you adopt this technology, particularly with respect to IT security policies and access rights.

All those high hopes of self-service data analysis, visualizations, and contextual insights can be dashed at the door of sophisticated security policies and the like. With Atlas from insightsoftware, your data access rights are integral to the process of getting data out of your Microsoft Dynamics systems.

Atlas is built for Dynamics AX and Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain Management, allowing you to use data from all Dynamics modules, including vertical and customized tables, within the secure framework of Microsoft Dynamics, ensuring controlled access to sensitive data. Because you can only access the data you have permission to see, Atlas is an ideal conduit and data source for Power BI. This leaves you more time to create your own dashboard and data visualizations.

The Conduit Between Enterprise Data Systems and Power BI

To use Power BI, you usually need IT to connect it to your data. Then, depending on the access you get, you have to figure out how the data is organized before you can even think about building a dashboard or visualization. Atlas overcomes this: It understands your access rights and understands the data structures, allowing you more time to be productive and creative.

Use Existing Atlas Reports With Power BI

Power BI natively recognizes the objects and structures within Microsoft Excel, allowing you to pin ranges, charts, tables, and pivot tables directly to your dashboard. As a result, your Atlas reports—and all their associated representations in Excel—can be seamlessly consumed in Power BI. This includes calculations and managed columns, which are dynamically updated to ensure your data stays current.

Get In on the Action From Anywhere

Atlas reports can be published directly to PowerBI.com—there’s no need for you to access the Power BI Desktop. Your reports and data analysis are directly accessible in the Power BI cloud service. Access your vital business information from any internet-connected device—computer, phone, or tablet—and rest assured that your carefully crafted formatting will be maintained through publishing.

Refresh On Demand or Schedule for Up-to-Date Results

Atlas offers a key benefit: on-demand spreadsheet refreshing for up-to-date results.

• OneDrive Integration: If your Atlas reports are stored on Microsoft OneDrive, you can:

  • Set up automatic refreshes on a schedule.

  • Refresh on-demand using the Atlas automation tool.

• Power BI Synchronization: When your Power BI dashboards use these refreshed spreadsheets as their data source, your dashboards will automatically be up to date.

• Simplified Process: No separate gateway installation is needed for this refresh.

This means you can confidently build your Power BI dashboards, knowing they will always display the latest information and be available on any device.

More Reporting Power With Atlas

Atlas empowers ad hoc analysis and visual exploration by giving you access to a whole new world of live customized data—anytime, anywhere. With Atlas, you gain powerful tools to organize and automate batches, streamline recurring tasks, and achieve lightning-fast file-based cache performance.

Ready to find out how Atlas can transform how you report against Microsoft Dynamics? Watch our on-demand webinar on leveraging Atlas to create self-service reports right in Excel without IT assistance.