Best of the Tableau Web... November 2014

What are we grateful for this month? A bountiful harvest of incredible blog posts! It was a bumper crop of Tableau tips and hints for everyone from the beginner on up to Jedi-level. So go ahead—tuck into this delightful spread of Tableau tips, tutorials, and clever hacks!

In my day job, I’m the customer story writer for Tableau. That means I spend most of my time hearing from customers across the globe about how they use Tableau.

One of my favorite things to hear about is how a customer went from their first trial download to becoming an experienced Tableau jockey. Almost every single customer mentions “the Tableau community” as a key part of this journey.

Image courtesy of data revelations

From the forums to Twitter to the Reddit /r/tableau subgroup—the Tableau community is absolutely filled with people ready, willing, and able to help other users. It’s something I got to see for myself this month as I read through dozens of thoughtful, insightful—and above all, helpful!—entries.

Getting Started

The Information Lab: The ‘Tableau Essentials’ blog channel
Gravy Anecdote: Data Visualisation and Process
The Information Lab: Index of “Show Me How” posts on the Tableau Show Me panel

Tips & Tricks

VizNinja: A handy list of resources for icons, shapes, and flags to enhance your vizzes
Tableau Tinkering: Tinkering with Filtering vs. Hiding

Beyond the Basics

Tableau Love: What’s new in maps in 8.2.4
Interworks Blog: Creating multi-state buttons in Tableau
Tableau Tinkering: Tinkering With Custom Percentile Bins
Gravy Anecdote: Tableau Design Month, Post 12 of 12: The Big Recap
Tableau Public: Pimp My Viz
Interworks Blog: Designing a Classic Timeline in Tableau
Tableau Tinkering: Tinkering with ‘ALL’ and ‘None’ in Titles

Use Cases

Lines, Tree Graphs, and Bar Charts, Oh My: Neighborhood Trick or Treat Analysis (Sweet Viz!)
Mario Talavera Writes: Using Threshold Analysis to Discover Emerging Crime Trends In Orlando
Interworks Blog: What League of Legends Tweets Can Tell Us about Market Opportunities
Datablick: How Far Can NY Taxi Data Take You?

Tableau Server

Tableau Love: Which EC2 instance type should I run Tableau Server on? Part two
The Information Lab: Exploring the Tableau Server database
Tableau Love: Dumping Tableau Server Permissions: The Story Can Now Be Told

Jedi

Data + Science: Building a Dynamic Sankey Diagram made of Polygons in Tableau

Commentary

VizWiz: Makeover Monday: The Facebook Election
WTF Visualizations: Obvious Chart is Obvious
Data Revelations: Tableau Software – The Greatest Support Community Ever? (Part One)