Hacker Month: Out of the Ordinary Vizzes

Tableau Public is a powerful software platform that authors use to visualize and analyze the stories of our time. We here on the Tableau Public team out in Seattle have been monitoring the work of the Tableau community for years now, and, more and more often of late, we have been amazed at the innovative and downright unexpected uses of the software. The lesson has become abundantly clear: people are getting really, really good at Tableau. We could not be more excited.

To celebrate, we have decided to make August, officially, Hacker Month. Hacker Month will celebrate the creative uses of Tableau Public to do something unexpected or out of the ordinary. These are the types of vizzes that make you scratch your head and say: “Huh?!?! However did they do that??” During Hacker Month we will introduce you to some of the tips and tricks that can turn you into a bona-fide Tableau Public Hacker. Think of them as “Level 3” or “Jedi” tricks.

Throughout the month we will be celebrating and shedding light on different ways to open up the Tableau Public hood and do some pretty crazy things. What, you ask, are some examples of Tableau hacks we have seen in the past? Here is a list to whet your palette:

Creating an informal poll and sending responses to Google Spreadsheets

Creating a network diagram for social

Challenging readers with a Viz Quiz

Even recreating the Enigma Machine in viz form

Creating a video game using the JavaScript API - Or pretty much anything with the JS API

Have you created an example of Tableau Hacking? Are you working on one now?