Spatial Union now possible

0:00In Tableau 2020.3, Tableau have added the

0:05ability to do Spatial Union. So you can

0:08essentially

0:08bring two shapefiles of a similar type

0:11together. Now it's important to remember

0:13that they have

0:14to be of a similar type. So you can't, for

0:17example, take like a GeoJSON and union it

0:20with like a KML sort of shapefile. You have

0:23to make sure they're of the same type. But

0:25apart from that, it's a pretty cool feature

0:27. Let's just hop into Tableau and I'll show

0:28you how that works. So I'm going to connect

0:31to the Spatial connection. So it's always

0:34like a little bit of a habitual thing. I

0:36always want to jump to some sort of thing

0:38like Excel

0:38because I'm used to joining Spatial data to

0:41actual data. But in this case, I'm just

0:43going

0:43to union two files. So let's take a look

0:46and see how that works. If I go to my

0:48desktop

0:48and I go to my 2020.3 folder, have some

0:52sample files and not in that folder, I have

0:54them

0:54over here actually. And I have two sets of

0:58geometry data from the United States. Now

1:01what I've done is I've actually downloaded

1:03these two files separately and I'll put a

1:05link to these in the notes below. But

1:07actually, if I go into this top directory,

1:10you'll see

1:11that there's two shapefiles. Now for this

1:13to work, they do need to be in the same

1:15folder.

1:16You have to move everything related to the

1:18shapefile into the same directory. You'll

1:19notice if I go back one and I go into my

1:21second one, there's no shapefile there

1:23because I

1:24have to move it into the same directory. I

1:26'm not exactly sure why this is, but I think

1:29it's part of the way that it works. If you

1:30try and do it with relationships, I think

1:32relationships gets in the way of you trying

1:34to do the union. So if they're in the same

1:36folder, it just seems to work. I can't

1:38explain it. But if I connect to this first

1:41one here,

1:41what you'll see is it behaves a bit like a

1:43CSV where it actually searches the whole

1:45directory

1:46and you can see both shapefiles available

1:49to us. Then it's treating the folders like

1:51a database and each shapefile as like a

1:54table. So there we have it. We have the two

1:56different

1:57types of spatial files. Just for context,

2:00one is at a congressional district level

2:02and

2:02another one is at a county level. Obviously

2:04, those two fall into each other. So the

2:06counties

2:07are actually part of the congressional

2:09districts, if that makes sense. You should

2:10be able to

2:11see a nice clean overlay where they cut off

2:14. So let's go ahead and actually make this a

2:17union. So what we can do is we can convert

2:19this to a union just by clicking that down

2:21arrow, convert to a union, and we get this

2:24visual interface here. And then the next

2:26thing

2:26we do is we simply drag the other file. So

2:29at the moment, we've got the CD116 file in

2:32there. I'm going to go ahead and grab the

2:34county file. This is essentially 116

2:37congressional

2:38districts. That's why it's 116. I don't

2:40know how many counties they are, but it's

2:42not in

2:43the file name. So that's now working. That

2:45's great. Click OK. And now it's union those

2:48two files because they work in exactly the

2:50same format, perfectly clean union. And you

2:53also get the new column that you're

2:54typically used to get in the union with the

2:56table name

2:56over here on the right-hand side. So that's

2:59a really nice addition because now when we

3:01go to visualize things, we have the two

3:03datasets available to us. And if I just

3:06bring the table

3:06name there, you can see the information.

3:09Now, obviously, what you want to do is

3:11visualize

3:12this information. So let's just go ahead

3:14and double click geometry. And you'll

3:16notice that

3:16it actually maps everything, everything in

3:19the dataset. And what you won't notice is

3:21that there's actually two layers of

3:22information on top of each other. What I

3:24have to do is

3:25I have to bring the table name onto color,

3:27and then you'll actually start to see a

3:28little

3:29bit of separation. If I go pan over here

3:31this way and I just zoom into the map, you

3:35can

3:35actually see them a little bit above each

3:38other. So you can just see the light blue

3:40and sort of lines in and amongst the

3:43congressional districts. So you can see the

3:47counties underneath

3:48the congressional districts. And if I

3:50actually select the orange one, you can see

3:52the counties

3:53coming up. And if I select the blue ones,

3:55you see the congressional districts. And so

3:57that's a really quick guide on how to union

3:59those two files. This is kind of cool

4:01because

4:02what it allows you to do is you can even

4:04create something like a set action to allow

4:07someone

4:08to switch between different levels of

4:10detail in the visualization and also in the

4:13actual

4:13data. So you could sort of start a story at

4:16the congressional district level, then

4:18maybe

4:18zoom into one particular congressional

4:20district and actually start to understand

4:22how those

4:23two work together. You could also maybe

4:25even do things like spatial overlaps to try

4:28and

4:28understand which one sits in which area and

4:30then try and put that information into your

4:33data. So Tableau has that intelligence

4:35built into the data source. But that's

4:37pretty much

4:37it. That's a little showcase of the new

4:40spatial union capabilities in 2020.3. If

4:43you've enjoyed

4:43this video, as always, be sure to check out

4:45some of the other videos on the channel as

4:47well as this playlist on 2020.3. And always

4:50let us know what we can do to improve the

4:52videos. If there's content we're missing,

4:53be sure to let us know. And I'll catch you

4:55in the next video.