Querying your model with SQL Server Management Studio and DAX

To wrap up the chapter, we are going to create a query in SSMS using DAX. First, DAX is not a query language, so the syntax is not as easy to understand at first for SQL users. The first difference is that you must start every query with EVALUATE. The EVALUATE function is used to analyze a table and return the values in the same way as a SELECT statement does with relational databases. To use EVALUATE, your outermost function must resolve to a table. Let's work through an example of this process:

1. Open SQL Server Management Studio and connect to your tabular model instance. You should see your workspace database there.
2. Right-click your workspace database and select New Query followed by DAX.
3. Add the EVAULATE statement.
4. In the first query, let's get the Item table using EVALUATE('Item'). Execute the query to return the contents of the Item table. You will notice that no measures are...