Marleen Meier - Mastering Tableau 2021: Implement advanced business intelligence techniques and analytics with Tableau, 3rd Edition

Mastering Tableau 2021

Third Edition

Implement advanced business intelligence techniques and analytics with Tableau

Marleen Meier

David Baldwin

BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI

Mastering Tableau 2021

Third Edition

Copyright 2021 Packt Publishing

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Producer: Tushar Gupta Acquisition Editor Peer Reviews: Divya Mudaliar Content Development Editor: Edward Doxey Technical Editor: Gaurav Gavas Project Editor: Parvathy Nair Proofreader: Safis Editing Indexer: Manju Arasan Presentation Designer: Ganesh Bhadwalkar

First published: May 2021

Production reference: 1270521

Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.Livery Place 35 Livery Street Birmingham B3 2PB, UK.

ISBN 978-1-80056-164-9

www.packt.com

Hello, I'm Kate Strachnyi, founder of DATAcated, and I am extremely passionate about data visualization and storytelling. In 2013, I made a career shift from risk management and regulatory compliance into the world of data analytics, and Tableau played a significant role in my professional journey. As I jumped into data analytics, I was provided with access to Tableau Desktop, along with various sets of data. My task was to derive insights and design visuals to support and communicate those insights. It was love at first sight. Tableau's intuitive layout made it easy for me to connect data sources and extract information, and I was able to build my first dashboard within minutes of obtaining access to the tool. From that point on, I was hooked on data visualization.

In this book, Mastering Tableau 2021 - Third Edition, Marleen Meier and David Baldwin take the reader on a journey that teaches the advanced offerings of Tableau 2021 and empowers them to tackle various data challenges. The book starts with the basics, by connecting Tableau to data and performing various data preparation activities, before going into more advanced features, such as Level of Detail calculations and data densification. The authors deftly illustrate Tableau's ability to create various charts with just a few clicks or by dragging and dropping fields into the view, which speeds up the visualization process and lets the user focus purely on the stories within the data. The authors take this a step further by demonstrating how basic visualizations can be evolved beyond their basic functionality. The book goes on to demonstrate a spectrum of advanced topics, including geo-spatial visualizations, time series visualizations, implementing Python and R functionality, and more!

My personal passion lies in using visual design best practices to tell impactful data stories. Meier and Baldwin make it simple to customize data visualizations and dashboards in a way that drives data-informed decision making, with a focus on formatting and design customization. This book considers the steps that we can take, such as reducing clutter, improving formatting, and using color intelligently, that can help tell more effective stories with data. Meier and Baldwin take the reader through the process of applying these steps in Tableau, discussing design theory, color rules, and other dos and don'ts of data visualization that will help focus your audience's attention.

In addition to designing useful dashboards, the book covers methods for improving the performance of those dashboards. The authors address various aspects of performance, with the intent of empowering the reader with techniques to create workbooks that load quickly and respond to end user interaction. With the end user in mind, Meier and Baldwin also provide extended use cases that take the reader through the thought process of analyzing queries, generating insights, and creating useful self-service dashboards. In doing so, the book helps you create visualizations to empower users (whether that might be your boss, a colleague, or a customer) to dig into data themselves, as opposed to waiting on IT or data teams to present it to them.

Kate Strachnyi DATAcated

Marleen Meier has been working in the field of data science since 2013. Her experience includes Tableau training, producing proofs of concept, and implementing and enabling projects, as well as quantitative analysis, machine learning and artificial intelligence. In 2018, she was a speaker at the Tableau conference, where she showcased an anomaly detection model using neural networks, visualized in Tableau. In February 2019, her first book in this series was published.

Writing this book has been such a rewarding journey and would never have been possible without the Packt team. I want to thank Tushar Gupta, Parvathy Nair, and Ravi Mistry for your encouragement, guidance, and great work relationshipsa special thanks to Edward Doxey, my editor, for your attention to detail and for always pushing me to do better. Thank you!

David Baldwin has provided consulting in the business intelligence sector for 21 years. His experience includes Tableau training and consulting, developing BI solutions, project management, technical writing, and the web and graphic design. His vertical experience includes corporate, government, higher education, and non-profit. As a Tableau trainer and consultant, David enjoys serving a variety of clients throughout the USA. Tableau provides David with a platform that collates his broad experience into a skill set that can service a diverse client base.

Many people provided invaluable support in the writing of this book. Although I cannot name everyone, I would like to draw special attention to my wife, Kara, and my children, Brent and Brooke, for their unfailing support. Also, my colleagues at Teknion Data Solutions exemplify world-class technical expertise and always challenge me to do my best.

Ravi Mistry is a Tableau Zen Master and Ambassador, and a data visualization specialist. A lapsed economist, he enables folks to make sense of data through analytics and visualization. When he's not following his hometown football team, Ipswich Town, Ravi is a keen enthusiast in contemporary technology, as well as TV, film, and media.