Power BI Data Management Example

Power BI data management features can host datasets alongside reports and other content for Power BI users to create reports and for analysis. They provide a structure for architecting deployments in which data access is centralized, and report creation and analysis are decentralized. The illustration shows an example Power BI Premium deployment (right) receiving data from on-premises and Azure-hosted data sources (left).

Architecture Basics 

A Power BI deployment contains up to three levels, depending on whether it is a Pro or Premium deployment:

• Tenancy is the highest level of deployment
• Capacity (for Premium only) is a set of allocated resources analogous to a VM with assigned virtual cores, which are split evenly between front-end processes (like user interaction) and back-end processes (like data management)
• Workspace is a secure area for creating and sharing content, typically created for specific activities or departments.

Enterprises typically have multiple capacities and numerous workspaces, each performing a different part of the overall design. Power BI Premium (and now Fabric) customers can have a tenancy with multiple capacities, and each capacity can contain multiple workspaces, while Power BI Pro customers can have a tenancy with multiple workspaces. The tenancy also includes access to the customer’s Entra ID (previously called Azure Active Directory) tenancy, which is used to authenticate users and store credentials that are used to secure workspaces, reports, and data.