Microsoft Business Intelligence Tools for Excel Analysts

Chapter 2: PivotTable Fundamentals

In This Chapter

• Creating PivotTables
• Customizing PivotTable fields, formats, and functions
• Using slicers to filter data
• Understanding the internal Data Model

As you gain an understanding of Microsoft’s BI tools, it becomes clear that PivotTables are an integral part of delivering business intelligence. Whether you’re working with Power Pivot (Chapters 3 and 4), Power View (Chapter 5), or even Power Map (Chapter 6), you eventually have to utilize some form of PivotTable structure to make those tools deliver the final solution to your audience.

If you’re new to PivotTables, this chapter gives you the fundamental understanding you need to continue exploring Microsoft’s BI tool set. If you’re already familiar with PivotTables, we recommend you skim the “Understanding the Internal Data Model” section later in this chapter. The internal Data Model is a feature introduced in Excel 2013 that essentially allows Power Pivot to run natively in Excel.

You can find the example file for this chapter on this book’s companion Web site at www.wiley.com/go/bitools in the workbook named Chapter 2 Samples.xlsx.

Introducing the PivotTable

A PivotTable is a tool that allows you to create an interactive view of your source data (commonly referred to as a PivotTable report). A PivotTable can help transform endless rows and columns of numbers into a meaningful presentation ...