*WORKING DRAFT

lab: title: ‘Real-time dashboards’ module: ‘Query data from a Kusto Query database in Microsoft Fabric’ —

Get started with querying a Kusto database in Microsoft Fabric

Real-time dashboards allow you to glean insight from within Microsoft Fabric using the Kusto Query Language (KQL) to retrieve both structure and unstructured data and render it in charts, scatterplots, tables, and more within panels that allow for linking similar to slicers within Power BI.

This lab takes approximately 25 minutes to complete.

Note: You need a Microsoft Fabric trial to complete this exercise.

Create a workspace

Before working with data in Fabric, create a workspace with the Fabric trial enabled.

  1. On the Microsoft Fabric home page, select Real-Time Analytics.
  2. In the menu bar on the left, select Workspaces (the icon looks similar to 🗇).
  3. Create a new workspace with a name of your choice, selecting a licensing mode that includes Fabric capacity (Trial, Premium, or Fabric).

  4. When your new workspace opens, it should be empty.

    Screenshot of an empty workspace in Fabric.

In this lab, you use the Real-Time Analytics (RTA) in Fabric to create a KQL database from a sample eventstream. Real-Time Analytics conveniently provides a sample dataset that you can use to explore RTA’s capabilities. You use this sample data to create KQL SQL queries and querysets that analyzes real-time data and allow for other uses in downstream processes.

Create a KQL Database

  1. Within the Real-Time Analytics, select the KQL Database box.

    Image of choose KQL Database

  2. You’re prompted to Name the KQL Database

    Image of name KQL Database

  3. Give the KQL Database a name that you remember, such as MyStockData, press Create.

  4. In the Database details panel, select the pencil icon to turn on availability in OneLake.

    Image of enable onelake

  5. Select sample data box from the options of Start by getting data.

    Image of selection options with sample data highlighted

  6. Choose the Automotive Metrics analytics box from the options for sample data.

    Image of choosing analytics data for lab

  7. Once the data is finished loading, we can verify the KQL Database is populated.

    Data being loaded into the KQL Database

  8. Once the data is loaded, verify the data is loaded into the KQL database. You can accomplish this operation by selecting the ellipsis (…) to the right of the table, navigating to Query table and selecting Show any 100 records.

    Image of selecting the top 100 files from the RawServerMetrics table

    NOTE: The first time you run this, it can take several seconds to allocate compute resources.

    Image of the 100 records from the data

Scenario

In this scenario, you’ll create a real-time dashboard based on sample data provided by Microsoft Fabric that will allow you to display data in a variety of methods, create a variable, and use this variable to link the dashboard panels together to gain deeper insight into what is going on within the source system(s). In this module we use the NY Taxi Dataset to look at the current details of trips by borough and the like.

  1. Navigate to Real-Time Analytics and then select Real-Time Dashboard on the Fabric main page.

    Select Real-Time Dashboards.

  2. Press on tne Add New Tile button.


Trips
| summarize ["Total Trip Distance"] = sum(trip_distance) by pickup_boroname
| project Borough = case(isempty(pickup_boroname) or isnull(pickup_boroname), "Unidentified", pickup_boroname), ["Total Trip Distance"]
| sort by Borough asc
  1. Press the Run button and verify your query has no errors.

  2. On the right side of the panel, select the Visual formatting tab and complete the Tile name and Visual type.

    Image of the visual formatting tile.