Analyze Model


Analyze Model shows the space consumed by columns in the model.

The purpose is to find where a model consumes memory in order to remove the more expensive columns that are not useful.

  1. Unreferenced columns
    The highlighted unreferenced columns are columns not used in measures and relationships of the model. However, unreferenced columns could be used in reports. Make sure that they are unnecessary at the report level before removing them from the model.
  2. Smaller columns…
    The link shows all the model columns, instead of showing only the five largest columns of the model by default.
  3. Group by Table
    Shows the columns grouped by table.
  4. Cardinality
    The cardinality value reports the number of rows in a table and the number of unique values in each column.
  5. Size
    The size value represents the amount of memory consumed by each table and column.
  6. Save as VPAX
    Saves the information collected by Analyze Model into an external VPAX file. The VPAX file can be opened by Bravo, DAX Studio, Tabular Editor, and VertiPaq Analyzer
  7. Treemap
    Shows the same memory size as an area.

The Group by Table visualization displays data in two levels: table and column.

  1. Search Column
    Filters the displayed columns by typing partial column names in the textbox.
  2. Show unreferenced columns only
    Displays only unreferenced columns, hiding columns that are used by relationships and DAX expressions in the model.
  3. Expand all
    Expands the table names, showing all the filtered columns for all the tables. The expand all does not remove the filter applied by the Search Column textbox.
  4. Collapse all
    Collapses the list and shows only table names, removing the detail of the columns. The size of each table only considers the columns filtered by the Search Column textbox.

Use Power BI Desktop to remove columns that are not useful after verifying that they are not used by any report. Remember that Bravo only checks that columns are referenced within the model, but it cannot verify whether a column is used in a report.

Last update: Apr 20, 2024