Anyone from New Zealand Government using the online Power BI service yet?

[jeffreyweir]

Howdy folks. I've been playing around with PowerBI Desktop in the New Zealand Government department in which I work. We're looking at switching on the PowerBI Report Server so we can share reports, as we already have the requisite PowerBI Premium licencing under our Software Assurance and Enterprise Agreement. (We *would* have to buy some PowerBI Pro subscription dev licences for a few of us developing PowerBI reports, but that’s a cost we’re happy with given it’s just $10USD per month per dev.)

But really, we'd prefer to use the cloud service, given the additional features it unlocks. I'm just about to start delving a little further into what signoffs we’d need in order to utilize the PowerBI service. Given that PowerBI is an off-the-shelf Azure-based service – and that DIA have provided some guidance specifically to support adoption of the Azure services – I’m wondering if the process to procure such a service is as overly onerous as I imagine it is. 

If we wanted to seriously consider using the Azure-based PowerBI service – without getting dragged down into a quagmire – does anyone have any words of wisdom around how to proceed, without getting stonewalled by the automatic 'too hard' I suspect will roll automatically off the tongues of certain types? It always helps if someone else has already jumped in the water, and can talk us (and other decision makers) through the process they went through themselves. We want to do this above the radar, but we don't want to get shot down unneccassarily by friendly fire 😉

[v-jiascu-msft]

Hi @jeffreyweir,

I will strongly recommend the Power BI Service, which is so easy to use just like a desktop program. Questions first.

"I’m wondering if the process to procure such a service is as overly onerous as I imagine it is."

Power BI Service is a service that is provided by Microsoft. So customers only use the service and enjoy themselves. Just leave the hard work of the backend to Microsoft.

Technically speaking, I think the biggest feature of Power Service is sharing. We can publish reports into Service after manipulating dataset and creating reports. We also can create reports in the Service. The dashboards can bring all the reports together. The app workspaces can bring all the colleagues working together. The dashboards and the reports can be embedded with the apps of customers. There are still many other features.

Finally, Service is easy to use. There are free trials you can try. I hope you will get more information and responses from other professionals.

Best Regards!

Dale

[jeffreyweir]

Hi Dale. Sorry...my comment wasnt' clear. When I talked about 'onerous' I  referring to the internal signoff process likely required by government departments in IT, given the current New Zealand Government guidelines regarding moving  government data to the cloud.

[v-jiascu-msft]

Hi @jeffreyweir,

No worries, I get it now. That must be a lot of paper work and meetings. Anyway, have a nice weekend!

Best Regards!

Dale