The Power View connectivity for Multidimensional Models has been released to the public as part of SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 1 Cumulative Update 4. This announcement was made by Robert Bruckner to the SQL Server BI community last night, on May 31, 2013. The official public announcement, posted by Siva Harinath, is on the Analysis Service & PowerPivot Blog.
In March, I posted about the public preview of the “Microsoft SQL Server 2012 With Power View For Multidimensional Models”. Well, the official release is now available for those currently using SQL Server 2012. When the preview became available a couple of months ago, I was very excited to test it out so I downloaded it, quickly scanned the release notes and then proceeded to upgrade an existing SQL Server 2012 SP1 development server. What I missed in the release notes was the requirement to uninstall several existing components and then to install them from scratch. That wasn’t as easy as I had hoped but it’s pretty typical for prereleased software to not include upgrade support. After all, the product teams are focused on finishing features and debugging and not getting all the upgrades and installation details sorted out. Those steps usually happen last in the release cycle.
Not to worry, this new capability is now part of the Cumulative Update 4 for SQL Server 2012. This means that it will be fully-supported as an upgrade to an existing SQL Server 2012 installation. This is very exciting news. If you have seen Power View demonstrated with new SSAS tabular models and PowerPivot models in Excel and SharePoint, you know what a simple and powerful data browsing and visualization tool it is. Some people have been a little disappointed that Power View initially only worked with new xVelocity-based tabular models and not the multidimensional cubes built with SQL Server Analysis Services, that have become common in many Microsoft centered IT shops throughout the industry.
The Microsoft product teams have shared a lot of good news, like this, recently about BI innovations – with Power View in Excel 2013 and GeoFlow recently released. They are likely to share even more good news in the weeks and months ahead. It’s an exciting time to see some very impressive, powerful, fun to develop and fun to use BI business and IT tools all coming together to meet very real business problems.
I don’t know about you but I’m going to get this baby installed and working right away. I have clients who have been waiting patiently (and some not so patiently) to use Power View with their existing cubes. I love to be the bearer of good news.
As is usual when something noteworthy happens on the Microsoft BI community, Chris Webb has blog eloquently on the topic and with significant detail. Read today’s post on his blog here.
