Model the data
Domain 2 of PL-300 accounts for 25-30% of the exam. EarnYourCert has 116 original questions for this domain, all with explanations: 76 multiple choice, 17 yes/no and 23 completion or ordering items, like the real exam.
Domain 2 sample questions
8 questions from our 116-question bank for this domain. Try to answer before revealing the solution.
1. What does marking a table as a date table enable?
- Hiding the table from the report view
- Correct behavior of time intelligence functions
- Automatic row-level security
- Faster refresh of all tables
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Correct answer: B. A marked date table with continuous dates lets functions such as TOTALYTD and SAMEPERIODLASTYEAR work reliably.
2. Which function removes all filters from a table or column inside CALCULATE, for example to compute a percentage of total?
- KEEPFILTERS
- ALLSELECTED on the visual
- VALUES (or DISTINCT)
- ALL (or REMOVEFILTERS)
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Correct answer: D. ALL clears filters for the specified table or columns.
3. Which function returns the first N rows of a table ranked by an expression, such as the top 5 products by sales?
- TOPN
- SAMPLE only
- FIRSTNONBLANK
- EARLIER
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Correct answer: A. TOPN returns a table.
4. A measure must return 0 instead of blank when there are no sales. Which function is the most concise?
- DIVIDE([Sales], 1, 0) used as a wrapper around the measure
- COALESCE([Sales], 0)
- BLANK()
- IFERROR([Sales], 0)
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Correct answer: B. COALESCE returns the first non-blank argument.
5. A DateTime column has high cardinality because of time stamps and is only used by date. How can you improve compression?
- Duplicate the column in the fact table and hide the original one
- Split into Date and Time columns or keep only the date
- Convert the column to text
- Keep the milliseconds for precision and sort the column ascending
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Correct answer: B. Reducing granularity reduces cardinality.
6. Which tool helps you find slow visuals and see DAX query durations?
- Performance Analyzer
- Selection pane
- Themes
- Bookmarks pane
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Correct answer: A. Performance Analyzer records visual load times.
7. Which DAX approach is usually more efficient than iterating over a large table row by row?
- Nest several FILTER functions
- Use set-based aggregators and variables
- Use calculated columns for every metric
- Convert measures to text first
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Correct answer: B. Variables avoid recomputing expressions and aggregators leverage the storage engine.
8. A large Import table with incremental refresh must also show today's transactions in real time. What should you enable?
- Automatic page refresh on an Import-only model
- Get the latest data in real time with DirectQuery (hybrid table)
- Disable incremental refresh and refresh the full table every 30 minutes
- Auto date/time
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Correct answer: B. Hybrid tables keep historical partitions imported and add a DirectQuery partition for the latest data.