New in Tableau Prep Builder: Bulk cleaning operations and better Tableau Server Compatibility

Check out what’s new from Tableau Prep Builder. Bulk cleaning operations, connections highlighting, and better Tableau Server Compatibility.

Happy New Year from the Tableau Prep team! Last year, we released 11 versions of Tableau Prep Builder and we’re not slowing down. We’re kickstarting 2020 with a new version of Tableau Prep Builder that streamlines cleaning operations. Now you can add cleaning operations faster by pausing data updates while adding new steps. This allows you to add operations in bulk, before resuming the data updates, to see the collective results of those new steps.

We also listened to your feedback, and we are introducing a new mode that disables capabilities in Tableau Prep Builder that are not yet compatible with your Tableau Prep Conductor version on Tableau Server or Tableau Online —such as Duplicate Field, Keep Only Fields, or the R and Python script step. This ensures that your flows are fully compatible with your server environment so you can confidently operationalize them.

Additionally, in this release, you can now easily map your input fields to their originating connections in the connections pane. You can also choose to add the credentials for cloud file connectors (Box, Dropbox, Google Drive and OneDrive) when publishing your flows to Tableau Prep Conductor on Tableau Server. Read on to learn more about these new and improved features.

Pause data updates to add cleaning operations in bulk

You asked for a more efficient data preparation experience, especially when you know the exact steps needed to clean your data. With this release, you can add cleaning operations in bulk without seeing the data getting updated in the profile panes. Simply hit the new pause button to pause the interactive updates, add your operations in bulk, and then click resume to see the collective results of all the new steps you added. Note that while data interactive updates are paused, operations that rely heavily on data values (like filtering based on specific values) will be disabled until you resume the data updates.
With the ability to pause updates, you now have the flexibility to build your flow the way you want to. Adding operations in bulk has never been this easy.

New Prep Builder compatibility mode with Prep Conductor

If you are using Tableau Prep Conductor in Tableau Server or Tableau Online to operationalize your flows, you need to be able to seamlessly navigate between the desktop and the server experience. You may have a version of Server or Online that is older than your version of Prep Builder. To address this, in the last version of Tableau Prep Builder, we added warnings that alert you when you start using a feature that is newer than your Tableau Server version.

With this release we are extending this capability by introducing a new compatibility mode where only features that are fully compatible with your server version will be active. If a feature is incompatible, it will be greyed out and disabled. However, you will have the ability to enable the feature and use it locally, but the flow can only be run manually in Tableau Builder or from the command line. With this new enhancement, you can be confident that your flows are always compatible with your Tableau Server.

See which connections are used by Input steps in the Connections pane

While building your Prep Builder flows, you may occasionally want to change the connection attributes or the credentials for your Input steps. With this release, we are making it easier to quickly map your Input steps to their originating connections in the Connections pane. Simply select one or more of your Input steps and all the connections associated with those inputs will be highlighted in the Connections pane.

Add credentials for cloud files when publishing flows to Prep Conductor

With this release, we are also improving how you add and manage your credentials when accessing cloud files in Tableau Prep Conductor using the Box, Dropbox, Google Drive and OneDrive connectors. If you don’t have your credentials already stored in Tableau Server, with this release, you’ll be able to simply click “Add Credentials” in Prep Builder before publishing your flow to Prep Conductor. Create your new credentials in Tableau Server and choose if you want to use them with the flow you are publishing. No more guessing whether or not your flows have the right credentials to run on Prep Conductor.