Persona: Developer (Author, Refactor, Validate)
This page is a practical workflow for developers/BI engineers using MCP Engine to implement semantic model changes safely (measures, schema, security), with validation and governance.
What you typically want
- Implement new measures/KPIs and maintain consistent conventions.
- Refactor safely (renames, deprecations, calc groups).
- Manage schema changes (relationships, partitions) with impact analysis.
- Validate changes with query suites and (optionally) unit tests.
Recommended workflow (safe authoring loop)
Connect + confirm context
"Connect to
<model>and confirm Desktop vs Service + model id. Don't auto-select." For the full connection workflow, see Connecting and Context.Capture the current baseline
“Summarize current state for the objects we’ll touch (names + current expressions).”“If Pro is available, create a checkpoint namedbefore-change.”Impact-first planning
“Run impact analysis for any rename/delete candidates and summarize the blast radius.”“Propose a minimal change plan. Wait for my confirmation before writes.”Apply changes in small batches
“Apply step 1 only, then stop and summarize what changed.”Validate immediately
“Run the validation query suite and summarize results.”“If unit tests exist, run the baseline test pack and export results as Markdown.”
Developer prompt templates (copy/paste)
“Implement measure and validate”
“Create measureTotal Sales (description + folder). Then run a validation query by month for last 12 months (aggregates only).”
“Refactor safely”
“We want to rename[Sales] → [Total Sales]. First list dependents. Propose a safe rename plan. Wait for confirmation. Apply and validate.”
“Schema change (relationship)”
“Propose a relationship betweenSales[CustomerId] and Customers[CustomerId]. Explain cardinality/direction and ambiguity risk. Wait for confirmation. Apply and validate totals.”