Power BI Desktop – Hanging around the other-side of the tracks

Microsoft is often accused of not engaging with the open-source community, but this isn’t entirely true. There are several stable open-source tools available for Power BI Desktop. For those familiar with these tools, there are even more options, including some created specifically for Power BI in the cloud.

Many of these tools are free and can be easily installed and learned. Among the ones listed below, three are particularly geared towards serious developers and can be used either standalone or integrated into environments like Visual Studio Code. These tools can help automate and simplify various tasks in your pipeline.

It's important to note that, according to Microsoft documentation, "External tools aren't supported in Power BI Desktop for Power BI Report Server, and Microsoft will not provide support, even for paid subscribers, if the issue can be reproduced with Microsoft tools, such as SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), or sample code that uses the public Microsoft APIs."

From personal experience, I’ve used all of the tools listed below and found that any issues I encountered were typically resolvable with a quick Google search. Additionally, many of these free tools integrate into the Power BI menu for easy access.

Here’s a quick overview of some useful tools (from MS Docs): PowerBI.tips:

Business Ops: A deployment tool for adding external tools extensions to Power BI Desktop. It provides a one-stop shop for installing the latest versions of external tools.

Tabular Editor:

This tool allows model creators to build, maintain, and manage tabular models using an intuitive editor. It supports hierarchical views, multi-select property editing, and DAX syntax highlighting. Learn more at [tabulareditor.com](https://tabulareditor.com).

DAX Studio:

A comprehensive tool for DAX authoring, diagnosis, performance tuning, and analysis. It features object browsing, integrated tracing, and detailed query execution statistics. Find the latest version on [GitHub](https://github.com/DaxStudio/DaxStudio).

ALM Toolkit:

A schema compare tool for Power BI and semantic models, useful for application lifecycle management (ALM). It supports deployment across environments, incremental refresh historical data, and metadata file diffing and merging. Get the latest version at [alm-toolkit.com](https://alm-toolkit.com).

Metadata Translator:

This tool streamlines the localization of Power BI models and semantic models. It automatically translates captions, descriptions, and display folder names using Azure Cognitive Services. It also supports exporting and importing translations via CSV files for bulk editing. Check it out on [GitHub](https://github.com/MetadataTranslator/MetadataTranslator).

These tools can be particularly helpful for new BI users and Python developers who appreciate scripting integration. Give them a try!

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