Exam DP-500: Designing and Implementing Enterprise Scale Analytics Solutions Using Microsoft Azure and Microsoft Power BI (Beta)

In recent days voluminous data generated at the enterprise level with rapid digital transformation has created room for the proliferation of data silos. Analyzing, interpreting, and acting upon data silos is a hurricane task for analysts.  

The Microsoft DP-500 Azure Enterprise Data Analyst Associate certification helps data analysts to extract data from heterogeneous sources and then model and analyze the same to arrive at beneficial business decisions. This examination can work as a panacea for Data Analysts to effectively overcome data silos generated at enterprises. Currently, this certification is available in the beta version. This blog post focuses on the prerequisites to take this examination and the critical skills measured by this examination in a detailed way. 

Is DP-500: Azure Enterprise Data Analyst Associate Exam Designed for you?

in this Microsoft DP-500 Exam training guide we are sharing essential prerequisites for aspirants keen to take up this beta examination:  

• Prior experience designing, creating, and deploying enterprise-scale data analytics solutions are preferable.  
• Experience in cleaning and transforming data, building enterprise data models, handling advanced analytics capabilities, integrating IT infrastructure, and the ability to apply development lifecycle practices is desirable.  
• Aspirants should possess advanced Power BI skills that include managing data repositories and data processing in the cloud and on-premises environments.  
• Develop competency in working with Power Query and Data Analysis Expressions (DAX).  
• Skills to consume data from Azure Synapse Analytics.  
• Ability to carry out queries on relational databases, analyze data through Transact-SQL (T-SQL), and visualize data. 

Aspirants keen to earn this certification should pass Exam DP-500 Designing and Implementing Enterprise-Scale Analytics Solutions Using Microsoft Azure and Microsoft Power BI which is currently available as a new Beta course. The DP-500 exam preparation demands rigorous training and dedication. This study guide also throws light on different skills that get assessed through this beta course.       

Skills Measured

This Exam DP-500 study guide provides a detailed view of various skills measured by this beta certification course.

Implement and Manage a Data Analytics Environment (25–30%)

Governing and administering a data analytics environment

• Power BI assets management using Azure Purview. 
• Employing Azure Purview for identifying data sources in Azure 

• Skills to recommend Power BI admin portal settings.  
• Ability to recommend monitoring and auditing solutions for data analytics environment, that comprises of Power BI REST API and PowerShell cmdlets. 

Integrate an analytics platform into an existing IT infrastructure

• Ability to identify solutions, including features, performance, and licensing strategy requirements. 
• Hone skills in configuring and managing Power BI capacity. 

• Develop competency in recommending and configuring on-premises gateways in Power BI.  
• Expertise to recommend and configure a Power BI tenant or workspace and integrate with Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2.  
• Competency in integrating an existing Power BI workspace with Azure Synapse Analytics.

Manage the analytics development lifecycle

• Skills to work with code and artifacts on a source control repository in Azure Synapse Analytics. 

• Ability to suggest Power BI asset deployment strategy.  
• Provide a source control strategy for Power BI assets.  
• Capability to implement and manage deployment pipelines in Power BI.  
• Expertise in performing impact analysis of downstream dependencies from dataflows and datasets. 
• The caliber of recommending automation solutions for different analytics development lifecycles, including Power BI REST API and PowerShell cmdlets.  

• Prowess in deploying and managing datasets by using the XMLA endpoint.  
• Competency in creating reusable assets, including Power BI templates, Power BI data source (.pbids) files, and shared datasets. 
• Generate queries for advanced data sources, including JSON, Parquet, APIs, and Azure Machine Learning models. 

Implement and Manage Data Models (25–30%)

Design and build tabular models

• Ability to select the DirectQuery for Power BI datasets.  
• Display skills of appropriate usage of external tools like DAX Studio and Tabular Editor 2, create calculation groups.  
• Ability to write calculations comprising of DAX variables and functions such as handling blanks or errors, creating virtual relationships, and working with iterators. 
• Expertise in designing and building large-format datasets.  
• Prowess in designing and building composite models that comprise aggregations.  
• Skills in designing and implementing enterprise-scale row-level security and object-level security.

Optimizing enterprise-scale data models

• Display caliber of identifying and implementing performance improvements in queries and report visuals.  
• Ability to troubleshoot DAX performance through DAX Studio  
• Competency in optimizing  data models through Tabular Editor 2  
• Skill to analyze data model efficiency by employing vertipaq Analyzer  
• The talent for implementing incremental refresh.  
• Showcase skills to optimize data models by employing denormalization. 

Explore and Visualize Data (20–25%)

Explore data by using Azure Synapse Analytics

• The capability of exploring data by using native visuals in Spark notebooks.  
• The prowess of exploring and visualizing data by using the Azure Synapse SQL results pane.

Visualize data by using Power BI

• The ability to create and import a custom report theme.  
• Demonstrate skills in creating R or Python visuals in Power BI.  
• Display skills in connecting and querying datasets through the XMLA endpoint.  
• Design, develop and configure accessibility reports on Power BI.   
• Competency in enabling personalized visuals through reports.  
• Ability to configure automatic page refresh.  
• Demonstrate skills to create and distribute paginated reports in Power BI Report Builder.  

About CloudThat

CloudThat leads the cloud training and consulting deck in India since 2012. We are a cloud-agnostic organization offering training in cloud and other niche technologies like DevOps, and AI/ML. IoT, etc. We have the rare distinction of being an Authorized Training Partner for Microsoft, AWS, Google, and VMware. As a Microsoft Gold Partner, Advanced AWS Consulting Partner, Authorized AWS Training Partner, Authorized Google Cloud Partner, and Authorized VMware Training Reseller we have helped 500k+ professionals to carve a niche in the cloud computing stream.  

Moreover, our courses are aligned with the official curriculum of industry stalwarts like Microsoft, AWS, Google, and VMware and are delivered through industry-certified trainers. The training is curated with an emphasis on hands-on lab sessions, rigorous training, and practice sessions via the Exam Preparation portal. Moreover, with this Exam DP-500 blog post we have put an effort to bring out the details on how to approach the latest DP-500 examination? and how to prepare for this DP-500 exam.   

References

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/exams/dp-500

WRITTEN BY Ravichandra M

Ravichandra M is a Passionate Blogger & Trainer with a wide array of experience in teaching and writing. Currently he is working as Technical Content Writer at CloudThat. He has acquired Smart Blogger Content Marketing Certification and HubSpot SEO Certifications. He also writes articles to newspapers on career guidance topics.