Create a PowerPivot BI Application for AX Project Postings

PowerPivot is a great extension for Excel to realize BI applications in very short. For Excel 2010 download and install the free PowerPivot extension. PowerPivot ist built in with Excel 2013. To activate PowerPivot go to File > Options > Addins > Choose COM Addins > activate PowerPivot.

Load Data

Open PowerPivot Window > External Data > SQL Server. Provide Credentials to access Dynamics AX database. Select PROJTABLE, PROJJOURNALTRANS, HCMWORKER and DIRPARTYTABLE. For each table open the preview and select the following fields.

ProjTable	ProjId	Name	DataAreaId
ProjJournalTrans	ProjId	CategoryId	Txt	Qty	Transdate	Worker	DataAreaId
HcmWorker	Person	RecId
DirPartytable	Name	RecId

In the import wizard set a filter on the DataAreaId for PROJTABLE and PROJJOURNALTRANS on CEU

After the tables have been imported, create relations between these tables. Back in the PowerPivot window > Relations > Manage Relations create these relations.

• ProjJournalTrans[PROJID] to ProjTable[PROJID]
• ProjJournaltrans[WORKER] to HcmWorker[RECID]
• HcmWorker[PERSON] to DirPartytable[RECID]

In the PowerPivot window select PROJJOURNALTRANS table and on the right side after the last column select the new empty column. Write =YEAR(‘PROJJOURNALTRANS’[TRANSDATE]) in the formula text field. Rename the new calculated field to YEAR. Add a second calculated column =MONTH(‘PROJJOURNALTRANS’[TRANSDATE]) and rename to MONTH

Create the first pivot table

Close the PowerPivot windows and return to Excel. From the PowerPivot tab create new pivot table. Place the PROJJOURNALTRANS[QTY] field in the right lower Values box. Place PROJTABLE[NAME] and PROJJOURNALTRANS[CATEGORYID] in the rows box. Place PROJTABLE[NAME] and PROJJOURNALTRANS[CATEGORYID] in the vertical slicer box. Place PROJJOURNALTRANS[YEAR] and PROJJOURNALTRANS[MONTH] in the columns box and horizontal slicer.

Create charts

From the PowerPivot tab open the PowerPivot table dropdown, select 2 charts vertical and place them in a new sheet. For both charts place the PROJJOURNALTRANS[QTY] in the lower right values box. For the first diagram place the PROJTABLE[NAME] field in the columns box. In the second diagram place the DIRPARTYTABLE[NAME] in the rows box. Now there are two diagrams, postings per employee and postings per project. Place PROJTABLE[NAME], PROJJOURNALTRANS[CATEGORYID] and DIRPARTYTABLE[NAME] in the vertical slicer. Place PROJJOURNALTRANS[YEAR] and PROJJOURNALTRANS[MONTH] in the horizontal slicer.

Connect Slicer to other sheets

Select the YEAR slicer, from the context menu open the pivot table connections. Connect the slicer to the other pivot table created earlier. By connecting the slicer a selection made on one sheet also effects the other sheet.

Create Measures and define a KPI

From the PowerPivot tab, PowerPivot table dropdown create a new simple pivot table on a new sheet. Place the DIRPARTYTABLE[NAME] field in the rows box. Place the PROJJOURNALTRANS[YEAR] in the horizontal slicer On the fieldlist select the PROJJOURNALTRANS table and create a new measure from the PowerPivot tab. Call the measure M_TOTAL and use the formula  =sum(PROJJOURNALTRANS[QTY])

Create a second measure on the PROJJOURNALTRANS table called M_ABSENCE. This will be the sum of all postings made on project HOLIDAY (PROJID 50002) and ILLNESS (PROJID 50003). Use the formula
=CALCULATE(sum([QTY]);PROJJOURNALTRANS[PROJID] = "50002" || PROJJOURNALTRANS[PROJID] = "50003") .

On the fieldlist, select the measure M_ABSENCE in the PROJJOURNALTRANS table. From the PowerPivot tab, create a new Key Performance Indicator (KPI) based on the M_ABSENCE Measure. Select the M_TOTAL as target. Choose green > yellow > red color schema. Define green to be from 0 – 5 percent, yellow from 5 to 10 percent and red to all above.

The pivot table with KPI should look like this