Tableau Tips: displaying growth rates in maps
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A recent training attendee asked how to show year over year growth in a map. In particular, they wanted to use the Year over Year growth selection from the Quick Table Calculation menu. This simple dashboard
A response to the TDWI article, “An Imperative to Build, Not Buy, Agile BI”
As TDWI and vendors catch on to the success of “Agile BI” being created with products like Tableau, I find the need to reply to the idea that the same old technology will work in this new world. This article from TDWI energized me to write a response to this frequently cited idea. In case you aren’t familiar with the acronmym “BI”, it simply means business intelligence, typically referring to traditional tools like Cognos, Business Objects, Excel, Microstrategy, SAS and many other products.
What is Agile BI? Read the rest of this entry »
“Agile BI” is new-found jargon that describes what
Map dashboard, state budget shortfalls for 2011, just 30 minutes with Tableau
Time magazine recently published a map of state budget shortfalls for 2011 by state. While this was a good attempt, I thought it would be informative to show this data in Tableau to offer additional insight. The image of Time’s map is not as clear as a regular scanned image since I used my iPhone- taking the photo on a flight!
There are three primary areas for improvement
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Thoughts about “Circle-Lust Continues”, just 30 minutes with Tableau
I read with fascination that this visualization won the Sunlight Foundation’s $5,000 prize for “Best Visualization Using Data about US Spending”.
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This graphic is
Dashboard tips by example- maps to inform, standard and novel approaches
Dashboards developed for clients frequently incorporate maps. Tableau offers quick, simple yet insightful mapping capabilities out of the box.
I have noticed that many maps used in my client’s dashboards attempt to display continuous measures. Examples include sales in the past quarter, year to date expenses versus budget or number of open sales opportunities. All of these metrics have shared issues in maps- a small range of the metric may be the dominant value in the display, making it difficult to differentiate amongst the values on the map.
In this post, I will review some common and novel approaches to mapping this type of metric.
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Add Your Comment HereTableau Tips: Synchronizing Multiple Data Sources in a Tableau Dashboard
The setup
You have connected to more than one data source in your Tableau workbook, for example, your sales database in Oracle and a customer call database in SQL Server. Tableau seamlessly allows you to connect to multiple data sources in one workbook. Views developed from both data sources can be placed in a single dashboard.
However, if you try to use global filters or quick filters to synchronize the two data sources, you will find that it isn’t possible; only one data source can be linked to either. In fact, the term “Global” filter in Tableau can be confounding, since it is only global to views using the current data source. Global filters will not work with other data sources even if the data items have the same name!
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As of Tableau 5.0 (released in 2009), a new feature
Some of our favorite articles from Stephen Few…
Stephen Few has has been an inspiration to us through the years. He has patiently prodded software companies to improve their tools for visual presentation of information, motivated by the sincere hope to improve the world we all live in.
At Freakalytics, we incorporate his content
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Dashboard Nirvana and Visual Management of Marketing Programs
View and interact with the strategic customer sales and analyst exploratory dashboards below, both hosted by tableau public.
Read Eileen’s white paper, “Visual Management of Marketing Programs“, for detailed explanations on maximizing Marketing ROI with visual marketing dashboards.
For practical, tested in the trenches advice on creating great dashboards for marketing programs, view Stephen’s Dashboard Nirvana webinar.
In this case study, we used customer demographic and sales databases from a boutique winery in combination with Tableau Software
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Webinar – Achieve Marketing Dashboard Nirvana
Practical tips for quickly building and maintaining these data insight tools Read the rest of this entry »
Tuesday, March 2, 2010- 2:00 PM Eastern Time / 11:00 AM Pacific Time
tableau public – share your visual insights with the world!
tableau public is now available! What’s not to love? Free web hosting of your visualization and a free desktop license of tableau public, based on the award-winning, rapid data visualization tools in Tableau Desktop and Tableau Server. With tableau public, you can learn the breadth of Tableau while sharing your insights with the world on any blog or web site.
Freakalytics is excited to be featured on the home page of tableau public, highlighting our stock market returns dashboard!
Click here to read the details about this dashboard, from our blog post last June.
Embedding tableau public content is simple and quick. Your web site visitors will need NO software installation, since Tableau depends on native Ajax functionality used by sites like GMail. Although not officially supported in the current release, tableau public is viewable and functions interactively on the iPhone based on our simple tests!
On your Tableau journey, consider…
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Tableau College Student Edition for Just $69-$99!
Learn the hottest visual analysis tool and impress your friends, your professors, your drinking buddies and even your family with incredible visual analytics from Tableau! From great data presentations to data exploration to dashboards that wow your class, get all the features of Tableau Professional edition for $69 for 6 months or $99 for 12 months.
Consider picking up a copy of our book on Tableau to master Tableau in short order, just $39 on Amazon. Browse the Table of Contents and the 1st overview chapter here.
All the best in your data adventures!
Stephen McDaniel
Tableau Training by Freakalytics, Orlando, FL, Jan 26-28, 2010
Announcing the availability of our first Tableau Training location in 2010- sunny, warm Orlando, FL! Topics include visual analysis for presentation, data exploration and dashboard design. Tableau Certification is also available. Read the details and find other upcoming locations in 2010 at http://www.Freakalytics.com/training.
Freakalytics also works with many leading organizations to present our highly-rated training on-site, see http://www.freakalytics.com/consulting. On-site training is a great value for teams of 5 or more people seeking to make the most of their investment in Tableau Software in short order!
Add Your Comment HereWaterfall Chart in Tableau and a Superior Alternative…
The 1st workbook walks you through building a standard Waterfall chart in Tableau. Waterfall charts are intended to show you how cash balances change over time based on transactions that either add to or subtract from the cash account of a business.
As this example demonstrates, many non-standard chart types can be created in Tableau using advanced features of the product. This chart type is a frequent request of students in our public and on-site Tableau training courses.
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Tableau training & certification, hands-on and in-person- US & international locations
Attend hands-on Tableau training taught by the author of the first book on Tableau, Stephen McDaniel. Please join us in Seattle this September, New York or Washington, DC this October, or London or Dallas, TX this November. Register early and save $100-$300 (US course locations).
Our London training seminar is being offered in conjunction with marketingQED, Ltd of London. marketingQED has previously hosted seminars with Stephen Few and offers tools, training and support services for the marketing industry.
Both the introductory and advanced Tableau courses are based on Stephen’s new book, “Rapid Graphs with Tableau Software: Create Intuitive, Actionable Insights in Just 15 Days“. The Tableau Certification exam, which is issued by Tableau Software, is available at the conclusion of the advanced class. The courses also integrate the principles of communicating with graphs, visual data exploration and dashboard design from Stephen Few’s books. Click here for locations, dates, course highlights and more.
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