What are the .Year, .Quarter, etc. options that appear after a DAX reference to a Date called?

[Anonymous]

When I create a new column and refer to a date column (e.g., =[Date of the Transaction] ), I get an intellisense pop-up that shows a whole bunch of "break-downs" for the date (.Year, .Quarter, .Month). Is there an official term for these amazingly useful options?

[Phil_Seamark · Accepted solution]

There is an option in Power BI Desktop that enables "auto date time", which means for every column in your model that uses a Date (or DateTime) data type, Power BI Desktop will automatically create a hidden table that carries columns such as Month, Quarter etc.  

It's a quick and easy way to add time intelligence to your model.  I normally turn this off and use my own date tables.

They can be handy if you are just trying to get something done quickly.