PASSMN Meeting 2025-08-19 (Virtual Meeting Only)

Important Note: This meeting is online only and will not be held at the Microsoft Technology Center

Agenda:
📅 Tuesday, August 19, 2025 📅
🕜 3:30-4:00 Kickoff / Announcements
🕜 4:00-5:00 Power BI Directory: Enhancing Data Navigation and User Experience (Miranda Grant)
🕜 5:00-5:10 Break
🕜 5:10-6:10 Power up Azure Data Factory Deployments from GitHub Actions (Erin Dempster)
🕜 6:10-6:15 Closing

Sessions

🕜 4:00 pm
⭐️ Power BI Directory: Enhancing Data Navigation and User Experience
🙂 Miranda Grant
Have you ever received a Power BI build request that closely resembles an existing report already in production? This often occurs when users are unaware of the available Power BI data. An enterprise solution can address this issue effectively, and where better to do so than in Power BI?
Explore how Community Health Network developed our Power BI Directory into a comprehensive hub. This all-in-one solution empowers users of all skill levels to discover available data and user permissions, consult analytics guides, and find resources to enhance their Power BI expertise. Additionally, we’ll explore how the app provides specific usage information for developers to drive improvements.
Created over five years ago, the Power BI Directory remains one of the most utilized applications within the company. This centralized resource integrates Power Apps and Power Automate, addressing numerous challenges effectively. Discover how the design of the Power BI Directory has evolved to meet the needs of users and developers alike, providing a robust platform for data discovery, analytics, and continuous improvement.
Target Audience: This session is ideal for data analysts, Power BI developers, and business intelligence professionals.
Tools used for development: Power BI, Power Apps, Power Automate

🕜 5:10 pm
⭐️ Power up Azure Data Factory Deployments from GitHub Actions
🙂 Erin Dempster
Azure Data Factory has 3 methods to deploy code.

1. Manual Deployment - copy JSON files between instances OR copy the entire ARM template.
2. Sync from source control repository (Azure DevOps or GitHub) - easier than copying files, but it's still manual.
3. Orchestrate deployments through ADF APIs - requires more upfront work but is a hands-off process, once it's in place.

In this session, we're going to skip the first two methods and go straight to orchestrating the deployment with GitHub Actions. We will briefly look at the API calls required to deploy changes. Ultimately, we will use a newly published GitHub Action to deploy changes.

Speakers

🙂 Speaker 1
⚡️ Power BI Directory: Enhancing Data Navigation and User Experience
Miranda Grant has been a Senior Business Intelligence Analyst at Community Health Network since 2018. Prior to this role she worked as an Infection Preventionist/healthcare worker for 10+ years. She has a master's degree in public health with a concentration in epidemiology. She is certified in Power BI and loves working with data.
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🔗 Speaker Link
Linked In
[msgrant421@gmail.com](mailto:msgrant421@gmail.com)

🙂 Speaker 2
⚡️ Power up Azure Data Factory Deployments from GitHub Actions
Erin is an Enterprise Architect at Trean Corporation and lives in Minneapolis. She has worked with PowerShell, Azure Data Factory automation and Azure DevOps/GitHub Actions for a few years. Additionally, Erin is Trean's database administrator and an Azure infrastructure administrator, managing the company's SQL Server environments.

🔗 Speaker Link
[erin.dempster@outlook.com](mailto:erin.dempster@outlook.com "mailto:erin.dempster@outlook.com")
LinkedIn
Erin Dempster's Speaker Profile
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