Introduction
Since saying the Common Availability of AI/BI Genie and introducing Databricks One at our most up-to-date Knowledge + AI Summit, we’ve continued to enhance how organizations analyze and act on knowledge. This month’s roundup highlights new capabilities in AI/BI Dashboards and Genie — from deeper semantic tooling to simpler customization and higher consumer expertise.
These updates are a part of our mission to make enterprise intelligence extra correct, versatile, and accessible. For context, Databricks AI/BI is a built-in suite of BI capabilities in Databricks SQL that lets customers ask questions in pure language, construct dashboards, and share insights — all powered by the Databricks Knowledge Intelligence Platform.
What’s New?
As common, let’s begin by a few of the main new headlines for each AI/BI Dashboards and Genie.
Dashboard Themes
Theme customization—probably the most ceaselessly requested options from prospects—is now out there in AI/BI Dashboards. Authors can now configure shade palettes and font kinds to raised align dashboards with their group’s branding requirements. These settings could be adjusted from the dashboard’s settings panel, the place customers can select a preset theme or outline a customized one—together with colours for textual content, background, widgets, and chart sequence, in addition to title alignment and font kinds. Theme modifications apply persistently throughout your complete dashboard and are preserved throughout export and import, enabling scalable, brand-aligned reporting throughout groups.
International Dashboard Filters
Dashboard authors can now outline International Filters that apply throughout all pages of a dashboard. Accessed by clicking the filter icon within the dashboard toolbar, International Filters open a configuration panel the place you may add interactive filter widgets scoped throughout your complete dashboard. Select from field-based filters (e.g., date pickers, categorical dropdowns) or parameter-driven filters, and specify default values to regulate habits on preliminary dashboard masses. This characteristic dramatically simplifies multi-page dashboard design—enabling constant, intuitive navigation and decreasing redundant setup—whereas giving customers a centralized filter expertise.
Dashboard Drill By way of
Drill By way of provides customers a strong new solution to discover dashboards by making use of alternatives from one web page as filters on one other. With this characteristic, viewers can right-click on a knowledge level in a supply visualization—equivalent to a bar, pie chart and navigate to a goal web page the place their choice is utilized as a neighborhood filter. For instance, choosing “United States” in a sales-by-country bar chart on a abstract web page can routinely filter the element web page to indicate solely U.S. knowledge. Drill By way of unlocks new workflows for investigative evaluation, serving to customers transfer seamlessly from high-level KPIs to deeper diagnostic insights without having to reset filters or manually repeat alternatives.
Dashboards File Add
Now you can add Excel, CSV, or TSV information instantly into Unity Catalog from the Dashboards knowledge tab. To outline a dataset from a file, after choosing a dashboard draft, navigate to Knowledge, select Add file, and specify the goal Catalog, Schema, and Desk identify. You select whether or not to create a brand new desk or overwrite an current one—simply guarantee you will have MANAGE privileges on the goal schema. As soon as uploaded, the file turns into a first-class dataset: question it utilizing SQL, visualize it instantly, or mix it with different Unity Catalog knowledge—all with out leaving the dashboard interface. This empowers customers to discover advert hoc or exterior knowledge seamlessly, decreasing friction within the analytics workflow.
Forecasting for Dashboard Line Charts
Now out there in Public Preview, AI/BI Dashboards now leverage the ai_forecast perform to let customers generate forecasts instantly from line charts, reworking historic developments knowledge into forward-looking insights. To make use of it, choose any line chart with a temporal x‑axis and a numeric y‑axis, then click on the “+ Forecast” button within the visualization editor and select “Add AI Forecast”. This creates a brand new chart that seamlessly overlays a forecasted pattern line. The underlying ai_forecast perform calculates projections primarily based in your chosen knowledge vary and aggregation logic. This characteristic makes it straightforward to anticipate future patterns—whether or not that’s gross sales efficiency, net visitors, or operational metrics—and incorporate proactive perception into your dashboards.
Enhanced Genie Information Retailer
AI/BI Genie’s information retailer is a foundational development for bettering the standard, relevance, and explainability of solutions returned by Genie. Out there inside every Genie house, the information retailer provides analysts a set of instruments to fine-tune how Genie understands knowledge—enabling extra reliable pure language interactions with out having to change upstream Unity Catalog property to begin curating the house.
Widespread queries are actually routinely surfaced when new tables are added, giving enterprise customers instructed Instance SQL primarily based on ceaselessly run queries that the writer has entry to.
Authors can even curate and edit dataset metadata for his or her Genie house with a number of new capabilities:
- Native desk and column descriptions permit authors to rapidly iterate on desk metadata inside a Genie house, without having to overwrite the descriptions in Unity Catalog. That is significantly useful when an writer lacks permission to change Unity Catalog property, desires to check totally different descriptions earlier than making a modification, or desires descriptions that enhance Genie accuracy however don’t belong as a central definition.
- Column synonyms make it simpler for Genie to map diverse enterprise phrases to the proper technical fields.
- Column present/conceal lets authors declutter the semantic floor by excluding duplicate, irrelevant or overly technical fields, with out requiring new tables or views.
- Instance values assist Genie higher perceive how your knowledge is formatted throughout all totally different column sorts (strings, numerics, dates, and so forth).
- Worth dictionaries assist Genie map consumer prompts to distinctive string values in your knowledge (e.g. mapping a consumer immediate for “UK” to “nation = United Kingdom”). Genie house authors can now add worth dictionaries for as much as 60 columns and 1,024 distinctive values per column.
- Be part of relationships can now be declared for any dataset to specify joinable datasets, SQL JOIN expressions, and be a part of sorts for use. This helps authors who lack permissions to set Main/International Keys in Unity Catalog or are working with views that don’t help Main/International Keys. Present Main/International Keys from Unity Catalog will routinely sync to cut back threat of duplication/battle.
Collectively, these new options give authors considerably extra management over Genie’s habits and allow extra correct, context-aware responses—marking an vital step towards delivering ruled, dependable, and business-aligned conversational analytics. These native variations of desk metadata let house authors rapidly iterate and outline context helpful for Genie without having to replace Unity Catalog globally. For extra data on Genie’s information retailer, please take a look at the product documentation.
Different notable options
We’re always working to develop and enhance AI/BI Dashboards and Genie with new options and capabilities. Our ongoing efforts spotlight our dedication to creating AI/BI extra user-friendly, sturdy, and impactful in supporting your group’s data-driven decision-making. Some noteworthy updates are included beneath; for an entire checklist of options and fixes, please discuss with the AI/BI product launch notes.
AI/BI Dashboards
- Choropleth Maps. Choropleth maps permit knowledge to be visualized geographically by coloring areas primarily based on aggregated values. Best for exhibiting patterns like income by state or incidents by nation, this new map sort helps U.S. and worldwide geographies and provides a spatial layer to decision-making in dashboards.
- Parameterized Dashboard Schedules. Authors can now outline named dashboard schedules with customized filter parameters, enabling focused report supply with out duplicating dashboards. That is ultimate for groups distributing experiences to totally different areas, enterprise models, or buyer segments — all whereas sustaining a single supply of reality and decreasing upkeep overhead. For extra data on creating and sustaining schedules, please discuss with the product documentation.
- Schedule With out Embedded Credentials (Run as Viewer). Scheduled dashboard deliveries can now be executed utilizing the recipient’s viewer permissions as a substitute of embedding the writer’s credentials. This enhances safety and entry governance, guaranteeing that every consumer sees solely the info they’re entitled to—and aligns supply habits with enterprise compliance insurance policies.
- Outline Customized Calculations Over a Vary: AGGREGATE OVER measures are actually supported in customized calculations, empowering analysts to create rankings, working totals, or shifting averages. This removes the necessity to outline window features throughout the SQL question instantly, enabling filtering and aggregations on the identical base dataset throughout a number of widgets.
AI/BI Genie
- Editable Outcomes Filters. Genie customers can now refine Genie solutions by modifying filters instantly throughout the outcomes panel. For instance, after receiving a solution filtered by a particular area or product, customers can rapidly regulate the filter values and regenerate outcomes — serving to customers rapidly appropriate queries and accelerating time to perception.
- Level Maps Now Supported. Genie now helps level maps in visible responses, enabling customers to view geographic knowledge plotted as particular person factors primarily based on coordinates. This enhancement brings location intelligence to conversational analytics and helps customers visualize patterns like retailer areas, service requests, or supply routes.
- Comply with-up Questions for Textual content Responses. Genie now suggests follow-up questions for text-based responses that don’t embrace generated SQL or end result units. Beforehand, follow-up prompts appeared solely after responses with knowledge output. Now, even responses like “Clarify the dataset” embrace instructed follow-up questions to assist customers uncover new questions they’ll ask and deepen their exploration inside a Genie house.
- Genie API Listing and Delete Operations. New API endpoints let builders programmatically checklist and delete Genie areas and conversations inside an area— serving to organizations automate governance, handle content material at scale, and combine Genie into current workflows and tooling. These APIs are an vital basis for groups rolling out Genie throughout massive enterprises.
What’s Subsequent?
We’re persevering with to construct towards a extra unified, clever, and accessible analytics expertise throughout Databricks AI/BI. Right here’s a fast have a look at what’s coming:
- Enterprise semantics throughout Genie and Dashboards — Already in Public Preview for Dashboards, Metric Views will quickly energy Genie as nicely, bringing trusted KPIs into pure language workflows and shutting the loop between visible and conversational analytics.
- APIs for embedded Genie experiences — New APIs will allow you to export/import areas and acquire reply suggestions, unlocking scalable deployment and tighter integration into your personal apps.
- Smarter Dashboards and simpler sharing — Quickly you’ll see a redesigned counter visualization, a brand new Apply button for filters, and help for CSV attachments in electronic mail subscriptions — all designed to spice up usability and attain throughout your group.
We’ll be diving deeper into AI/BI semantics in upcoming blogs and assets — so keep tuned!
Be taught Extra
For those who’re trying to expertise the most recent AI/BI capabilities firsthand, the choices beneath are designed to information you thru.
- Free Trial: Get hands-on expertise by signing up for a free trial.
- Documentation: Dive deeper into the small print with our documentation.
- Webpage: Go to our webpage to study extra.
- Demos: Watch our demo movies, take product excursions and get hands-on tutorials to see these AI/BI in motion.
- Coaching: Get began with free product coaching by Databricks Academy
- eBook: Obtain the Enterprise Intelligence meets AI eBook
