Tableau 10: Visualisation Enhancements

0:00Hey, it's Tim here. In today's video I'm

0:03going to be taking you through new features

0:05in Tableau 10.

0:07In this particular video I'm going to be

0:08focusing on the changes to the ways in

0:11which you can design visualizations.

0:14I have a workbook prepared which takes you

0:16through some of these new features and the

0:19first feature I want to focus on is the

0:20highlighter.

0:22Now in previous versions of Tableau, if I

0:25wanted to maybe look for a particular

0:27product in a very busy dataset, I would

0:30have normally used the wildcard search as I

0:33am now.

0:34And what that would have done is it would

0:36have filtered out the rest of the dataset.

0:38So I wouldn't be able to see all my

0:40products in the Acme range in the context

0:43of all my data.

0:45Now there would be other ways in which you

0:46could have done this.

0:47You could have done this possibly using a

0:48blend, but that would have only really

0:50worked in situations where you needed to

0:52aggregate the data.

0:54It would have been quite tricky to do the

0:56same effect as you could if you could just

0:58highlight particular sets of data.

1:01And so the way highlighting works is like

1:03so.

1:04But how do I highlight a particular group

1:06of products using a filter?

1:09Now that wasn't possible until in Tableau

1:1110 they introduced the highlighter.

1:14And so if I show the highlighter and I go

1:16in here, you can see that here I've already

1:19searched for Nokia.

1:21If I come back, I can search for a

1:22different product range.

1:24And this is quite nice because this allows

1:26for a much more interactive sort of search

1:28experience within your dataset.

1:31And secondly, it allows you to see trends

1:33within a very, very busy dataset and see

1:36what subsets of that particular product

1:38range are doing.

1:40So here I can immediately see that these

1:43two products are well above the norm for

1:47Nokia.

1:48If I go to another range like Xerox, I can

1:51see that there's an outlier here that I

1:54would never have been able to see if I was

1:55just looking at the whole dataset.

1:58And equally, if I search for it, it would

2:00have been distorted somewhat.

2:03The axis would have been distorted.

2:05I wouldn't have been able to easily see

2:07that this particular item was an outlier.

2:10So I think it's a really, really great

2:12feature and it's going to help make for

2:14much, much better dashboards.

2:16OK, the other feature is parameters and

2:18filters in Tableau 10.

2:20Now, these have just had a facelift,

2:22essentially.

2:23So if I change this to a compact list, you

2:25'll see that the design is more or less in

2:28line with Tableau 10.

2:30And the other thing about these is that I

2:31sort of feel like they're performing a lot

2:33quicker.

2:34If I just show you now, this might be

2:36because I've cached some of these, but if I

2:38just keep clicking through, it's still very

2:40, very, very fast.

2:42And so these are working really, really

2:44nice.

2:45And parameters too have this sort of change

2:47and it sits a little bit better on the

2:49dashboard as well.

2:51And you can style them a lot easier as well

2:52, which is great.

2:54Now, this next feature is the non-modal

2:57table calculation window.

2:59And this is a difficult feature to explain.

3:02So I'll just show it to you.

3:03So in previous versions of Tableau, when

3:05you wanted to use table calculations that

3:08were a little bit more complex,

3:10then basically you used to have to go to

3:11Quick Table calculation, choose the one you

3:14'd like.

3:15In this case, I've chosen the percent of

3:17total.

3:18And then following that, I would then go to

3:20Compute Using and I'd choose the way in

3:22which I wanted the calculation to be done.

3:25But there was no real feedback to let me

3:27know that it was being done in the correct

3:29way.

3:30Now, if you select Edit Table Calculation,

3:32you get this new window.

3:34And this new window is great for two

3:36reasons.

3:37Firstly, it's non-modal.

3:39So I can still interact with my

3:40visualization and I can even bring up the

3:43calculated field option.

3:45So these are normally two things you want

3:46to do at the same time, but for whatever

3:48reason, you can't up until Tableau 10.

3:51So now I can edit my calculation and

3:53simultaneously change the way in which my

3:55table calculation is working.

3:58I think that's such a powerful feature.

4:00Number two, it now highlights the table to

4:03show me the direction and order in which it

4:06's doing the calculation.

4:09And again, this is absolutely phenomenal

4:11because it very, very clearly shows the

4:13user or the developer what is happening

4:15with their calculation.

4:17And this was so hard to explain in the past

4:19, although Tableau have some great

4:21documentation on this.

4:23When you're in the flow of visual analysis,

4:25it was very, very hard sometimes to fully

4:27understand what was going on very, very

4:29quickly.

4:30And even when you choose specific

4:32dimensions, Tableau allows you to sort of

4:34build this out and select the areas that

4:37you want to be using for your calculation.

4:40And again, you still have your typical

4:42options here and you can sort in different

4:44ways.

4:45So I think that's a really, really neat

4:48addition to Tableau 10.

4:51This next feature is called mark sizing

4:53control, and I've used the profit bin

4:55example here, but it's a very subtle change

4:57.

4:58So let me just try and explain this.

5:00Profit bins are essentially like buckets.

5:03You're putting different sales or different

5:05profits or different items with certain

5:08profits in certain profit buckets.

5:11So here I have my 0 to 141, my 141 to 282,

5:16and it looks like the binomial curve.

5:19Now, if I change this to a continuous scale

5:21, I get a continuous scale along the bottom.

5:25But when I change the sizing, you can see

5:27that all I'm really doing is changing the

5:29size of the bar.

5:30It's not really reflecting the continuous

5:33nature of the axes.

5:35This bar should really take up the 0 to 141

5:39range.

5:40And that is what this new option is about.

5:43When I select fixed, note that I no longer

5:46have the slider and I have this ability to

5:50basically make the bar fit that particular

5:54bucket.

5:55So from here to here is actually 141.

5:59And as soon as it hits 141, it changes to

6:01the next one.

6:03Now, this is a great feature for two

6:05reasons.

6:06It allows you to build something called a

6:08Marameko chart.

6:09This is a new type of chart that you can

6:10now achieve using this functionality.

6:13There's some great blog posts on the Table

6:14au blog about that.

6:16And the second thing is you have a little

6:17bit more control about what's happening.

6:20You can even align your visualization or

6:22your bars to a particular position.

6:25And so I'm looking forward to seeing the

6:26interesting ways in which this can be

6:28manipulated.

6:29Normally, these sort of very subtle

6:31features allow you to do some very

6:33interesting hacks to much bigger, much more

6:36flexible datasets.

6:37And so I'm looking forward to seeing what

6:40we can build with that.

6:42Now, the last feature here is mapping.

6:44And you can see here Tableau has applied

6:45the default color set.

6:47It looks like all my cells are in the UK.

6:50So I'm actually just going to tell the

6:51sales of color just so that I can see all

6:53my states and countries very clearly.

6:56And you can see here that Tableau has

6:58created a fill map with where I have cells

7:01in particular states.

7:03And that's all the level of detail that

7:04this is in.

7:05If I take states off, then obviously the

7:07fill map becomes a country one.

7:10So let me put state back in.

7:12And what I want to do is create a custom

7:14sales region because my sales region don't

7:17necessarily map to states or countries.

7:20So I'm just going to select a few.

7:23And when I've done that, I'm just going to

7:25group them.

7:26I'm going to group the state and country

7:27together.

7:28And notice that it creates this grouping

7:30here on the right.

7:32And more subtly, it created this item here.

7:35And if I carry on grouping, you'll notice

7:40that all I'm doing is adding to this

7:42particular grouping.

7:44And that's me done.

7:46So those are my four sales regions.

7:48Now, I want to remove the boundary between

7:52the countries and the state.

7:56And with that in mind, I can just start

7:58removing state.

8:00And you can see that the state boundaries

8:02disappear.

8:03But I still have country boundaries in the

8:05background.

8:06So I'm going to remove that again and watch

8:08what happens.

8:10Tableau uses the newly created group to

8:13form the new boundaries.

8:16And I think that's absolutely fantastic

8:17because here you can very, very clearly see

8:21that I've been able to create my custom

8:23sales regions.

8:24And better yet, I can actually use this

8:27custom data in my own data source.

8:30So I can say, OK, here are my sales regions

8:32and here's how the sales were doing across

8:34those regions.

8:36So this is a really, really nice change to

8:38mapping.

8:39And I think this is obviously going to

8:41improve over time.

8:43It only really works where Tableau have the

8:45relevant data to be able to do this.

8:48So it might not always work in your country

8:50or region, but in most cases, it should be

8:53fine.

8:53And when you're visualizing on Tableau

8:55Public, I'm sure it's going to enable

8:57people to create much, much more exciting

8:59mapping contexts for their visualization.

9:03So that's it. Those are all the features

9:05that relate to visualizations.

9:08In the next video, I'm going to be focusing

9:10in on mobile dashboard design and how to

9:12design for mobile devices.

9:14And then in my last video, I'm going to be

9:16looking at changes to data and the new ways

9:18in which you can interact with data before

9:20creating your visualization.

9:23Thanks for listening and enjoy.