POWER BI - FIRST FLIGHT

Brian Kiprop — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 22:40:45 +0000

First of all, let me apologize to my viewers out there, wherever you are, existent or non-existent. I haven't been active here, but let's change that, shall we?

This week I started learning Power BI, and one thing became clear almost immediately: data is everywhere. It's living, breathing, moving, talking. Every interaction, transaction, click, conversation, and decision creates data. The real question isn't whether data exists—it's whether you know how to read it.

So, what is Power BI?

At first, I thought it was just another version of Excel. But after only a week of learning, I've realized it's much more than that. Think of it as Excel's more powerful sibling. While Excel is great for spreadsheets and analysis, Power BI is built to handle much larger datasets, connect to multiple data sources, and turn raw information into interactive dashboards and meaningful insights.

This week we explored the fundamentals, including where Power BI can get data from—Excel files, CSV files, the web, databases, and much more. We also learned why understanding data types is important. Knowing whether a column contains numbers, text, currency, dates, or time helps Power BI interpret and analyze the data correctly.

Power Query Editor

One concept I really liked was the Power Query Editor.

When importing data, you usually have two choices: Load or Transform Data.

Here's how I think about it:

Imagine a child comes home after playing outside. If you simply let them into the house without doing anything, that's like clicking Load you bring the data in exactly as it is.

Choosing Transform Data, on the other hand, is like washing the child, cleaning off the dirt, changing their clothes, and making sure they're presentable before they come inside. In data terms, this means cleaning your dataset by fixing errors, removing duplicates, changing data types, renaming columns, and preparing everything before analysis.

DAX Basics

We also got introduced to DAX (Data Analysis Expressions), which is Power BI's formula language.

DAX allows you to create measures, calculated columns, and other calculations that help you extract more meaning from your data.

For example, if you want to calculate the total revenue, you can use the SUM() function. Simple, but powerful.

Some other common DAX functions include:
Logical:IF(), SWITCH()
Date & Time:TODAY()
Text: LEN(), RIGHT()

I'm only one week in, but it's already changing how I think about data. Before, I mostly saw rows and columns. Now I'm starting to see stories, patterns, and insights waiting to be uncovered.

Looking forward to learning more and this time, I'll try not to disappear for so long.

How Excel is Used in Real-World Data Analysis

Brian Kiprop — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 12:23:55 +0000

Before this week, I thought Excel was just a fancy calculator with boxes. But after three days of my Data Science & Analytics course, I realise I was wrong. Really wrong.

Excel is a spreadsheet tool used by millions of people from small business owners to data analysts at giant companies. And the best part? You don’t need to be a programmer to use it. You just need to know a few tricks.

Here’s how Excel helps solve real-world problems using exactly what I learned in Week 1.

3 Real-World Ways Excel Is Used

Business decisions with logic
Managers use IF() statements to answer yes/no questions. Example: =IF(Sales>1000, "Bonus", "Needs Improvement"). One cell can decide who gets paid more.
Cleaning messy data
Real data is never clean. Marketing teams use Remove Duplicates, Find & Replace, and Text to Columns to fix hundreds of messy rows in seconds. No manual typing.
Tracking deadlines and ages
HR teams use DATEDIF() to calculate employee ages or years of service. TODAY() and NOW() keep reports automatically updated. No more “oh, I forgot to update the date.”

3 Excel Features I Learned This Week
Remove Duplicates – One click, and Excel deletes repeated rows. Saved me from sending the same customer email twice.

IFERROR() – Hides ugly errors like #DIV/0! and shows something friendly instead (e.g., “Check data”). Your boss will thank you.

Sort & Filter – With AutoFilter, I can find all sales above $500 in one second. Then Custom Sort lets me sort by date and region together.

My personal reflection
Honestly? Learning Excel has changed how I see data. I used to look at a messy spreadsheet and feel lost. Now I see Remove Duplicates, Text to Columns, and TRIM() as tiny tools that bring order to chaos.

Data isn’t scary anymore. It’s just a puzzle and Excel gives me the pieces.

I’m only one week in. But I already feel like a junior data analyst in training.

DEV Community: Brian Kiprop

POWER BI - FIRST FLIGHT

How Excel is Used in Real-World Data Analysis