Debating the 'best app wins' thesis

In this episode, we tackle a critical gap between Power BI's Field Parameters and Excel's live connection capabilities. Inspired by a mailbag submission from Eivind Haugen, we explore the tension between building semantic models that look great in Power BI reports versus models that serve all consumers—including the often-overlooked Excel power users.

We dig into why Field Parameters break the Excel experience, when Calculation Groups might be the better choice, and how to design semantic models that truly serve as a single source of truth across multiple consumption tools. If you're building models that connect to Excel, this conversation will change how you think about feature selection and governance.

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