So what is this book about? The title certainly points in the right direction: Mastering Tableau. The word Mastering implies a journey to a level of competency beyond mere familiarity or superficial knowledge. The word Tableau, of course, limits the scope of a particular software package. Let’s extend the title by one word in order to hone the focus: Mastering Tableau Desktop. The word Desktop further narrows consideration by communicating that this book is not focused on Tableau Server, although there is a chapter dedicated to interacting with Server. Nor does this book dive deep into topics beyond the realm of Tableau, though other technologies such as R and SQL are discussed as they pertain to Tableau. Furthermore, this book is not focused on data visualization or architectural theory per se, though these topics are explored and every attempt is made to adhere to sound methodology as technical problems are discussed. Instead, this book attempts to build on a foundation of an already basic understanding of Tableau Desktop so as to provide a theoretical and practical basis for solving real-world challenges in an efficient and elegant manner. Along the way, many tips and tricks for use in everyday work are discussed and exercises with careful step-by-step instructions and commentary are provided.
Chapter 1, Getting Up to Speed - a Review of the Basics, provides a quick on-ramp for those new to Tableau and a useful review for those with experience. For a more thorough consideration of fundamental topics, see Learning Tableau, written by Joshua Milligan and published by Packt Publishing.
Chapter 2, All about Data - Getting Your Data Ready, commences a series of three "All about Data" chapters. The chapter begins with a theoretical discussion of the Tableau data paradigm and data mining topics and then moves on to practical ways to use Tableau to survey and cleanse data.
Chapter 3, All about Data - Joins, Blends, and Data Structures, explores complex joins, data blending, and pivoting.
Chapter 4, All about Data - Data Densification, Cubes, and Big Data, ends the series of "All about Data" chapters by surveying a variety of data topics, including the undocumented world of data densification, working with cubes and big data considerations.
Chapter 5, Table Calculations, focuses on two questions: “What is the function?” and “How is the function applied?” These questions provide a framework for discussing directional and non-directional table calculations as well as partitioning and addressing.
Chapter 6, Level of Detail Calculations, begins with two playground environments created in Tableau designed to provide a foundation for understanding level-of-detail calculations and then moves on to practical application.
Chapter 7, Beyond the Basic Chart Types, looks at improving some popular visualization types and then considers the largely underexplored topic of using background images in Tableau. The workbook provided with this chapter also provides many additional visualization types.
Chapter 8, Mapping, begins by considering how to expand Tableau’s native mapping capabilities without leaving the interface, and then explores extending Tableau mapping via other technologies, including connecting to WMS servers and MapBox. Lastly, the chapter demonstrates how to provide the end user options for choosing different maps and ends with a discussion on custom polygons.
Chapter 9, Tableau for Presentations, discusses techniques for integrating Tableau with PowerPoint as well as how to use Tableau as a standalone presentation tool via animation and story points.
Chapter 10, Visualization Best Practices and Dashboard Design, begins by considering design topics such as formatting, color, and visualization types and then addresses dashboard layout options. The chapter ends by exploring sheet swapping in some depth.
Chapter 11, Improving Performance, is the longest chapter of the book and attempts to systematically (though not exhaustively) cover options for optimizing Tableau performance.
Chapter 12, Interacting with Tableau Server, explores how to optimize Tableau Server architecture for best performance and easiest maintenance. The chapter also considers the web authoring environment, user filters, and accessing the Performance Recording dashboard via Tableau Server.
Chapter 13, R Integration, begins by considering how to install and integrate R with Tableau and then explores R and Tableau integration via a series of exercises. The chapter ends with a troubleshooting section.
In order to make use of this book, an installation of Tableau 10 is required. The following technologies are mentioned and lightly utilized in this book but are not strictly required:
Chapter 2, All about Data - Getting Your Data Ready, makes light use of Adobe Acrobat.
Access to SQL Server is helpful in a few places, especially in Chapter 4, All about Data - Data Densification, Cubes, and Big Data.
Chapter 7, Beyond the Basic Chart Types, assumes access to Inkscape to complete two exercises (Inkscape is an open source vector drawing application that is similar to Adobe Illustrator).
Access to Tableau Server is helpful in a few places, especially Chapter 12, Interacting with Tableau Server, where permissions for publishing data sources and editing in the web authoring environment are assumed.
Access to Rserve is assumed for Chapter 13, R Integration. RGui and RStudio are also helpful but not strictly required.
Mastering Tableau targets persons with 5+ months of experience using Tableau. Although not strictly required, a thorough reading of the predecessor to this book, Learning Tableau, is helpful. Alternatively, the Desktop I and II training provided by Tableau provides a helpful foundation. A basic knowledge of SQL is helpful in a few sections. A basic knowledge of Excel is assumed.
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "We can include other contexts through the use of the include directive. "
A block of code is set as follows:
IF [Actual/Forecast] = "Actual" THEN SUM([World Indicators].[Country B Population]) ELSE PREVIOUS_VALUE(0) * [Select Country B Forecast] + PREVIOUS_VALUE(0) END
When it is necessary to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:
IF [Actual/Forecast] = "Actual" THEN SUM([World Indicators].[Country B Population]) ELSE PREVIOUS_VALUE(0) * [Select Country B Forecast] + PREVIOUS_VALUE(0) END
Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
# cd C:\Users\DavidBaldwin\Desktop\New_Directory
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes, for example, appear in the text like this: "Clicking on the Next button moves you to the next screen".
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