Tableau 8.3 Bronze Certification

Question 1

(Positioning Basics) Why use Tableau? What value does Tableau deliver?

Answer 1

Tableau empowers powerful analytics with a self-service methodology behind its software promoting speed, ease, and beautiful visualizations. While learning is involved, overall most users increase productivity by spending more time asking questions of data. Additional time asking questions allows new points of insight to be discovered. Tableau customers have a more complete picture of their projects and more options when decisions need to be made.

Question 2

(Positioning Basics) Who usually uses Tableau within a company?

Answer 2

Tableau’s mission is to help people see and understand their data. ‘People’ means anyone with questions about data. Tableau has grown into a leading provider of analytical software across the globe, across multiple industries. Let me share with you some customer stories.

Question 3

How long does it take to learn Tableau?

Answer 3

It’s extremely easy to install Tableau Desktop or Server, connect to data, and begin exploring data, but every customer has unique requirements. The learning curve really depends on the analysis and the environment where Tableau is deployed. To answer this question more precisely, let’s start a guided evaluation. Participation is mutual. We’ll help you determine how long Tableau adoption will take by guiding you through a use case. In return, we expect that you let sample of employees use Tableau.

Question 4

(Positioning Basics) We have a BI standard. How does Tableau differ?

Answer 4

Will you briefly describe your current standard? Is it open to change if Tableau proves to deliver the most benefit to your business? Tableau has found success by focusing on the gap created when business users cannot efficiently access rich stores of data collected by IT. This stifles the analytical curiosity business users and burdens IT with report pulling requests. Tableau changes the BI status quo by supplying a platform to help foster a collaborative environment for its customers; within organizations and across industries. We don’t believe in having IT and business users work in separate spheres. Instead we’ve found that the most efficiency and gains are found when both own one tool that can scale across the requirements of both departments.

Question 5

(Positioning Basics) I have free analytical software, why buy Tableau?

Answer 5

A lot of Tableau’s customer own free software. They chose to use Tableau because it fills a gap. Some examples include too much time to insight, too many reports, team members are not on the same page, or critical business decisions have been poorly decided or completely missed. Do you have a similar situation- what are your gaps?

Question 6

(Positioning Basics) How does Tableau help guarantee success?

Answer 6

Overall, Tableau software has one of the highest average customer satisfaction ratings for analytical software. We ensure success with our software in many ways. a. With you purchase, you enter into a customer success program where we contact you to make sure you’re achieving ROI on the product. b. We offer first come first serve tech support help on any issue or for general questions. c. Participation in Tableau’s community forum to share ideas with fellow members. d. Free resources like videos, weekly live training, and articles available through Tableausoftware.com. e. Tableau’s annual customer conference. We give you the best we have to offer in the form of support, interactive activities, and speakers.

Question 7

(Positioning Basics) Tableau’s main competitors?

Answer 7

Excel, Qlick, Microstrategy, Birst, Tibco Spotfire

Question 8

(Positioning Basics) What separates Tableau from competitors?

Answer 8

a. Time to Value: Tableau takes less time to deploy than many other BI vendors plus the user interface is built to be and strives to be user intuitive. b. Visual Analytics: Tableau Desktop renders visualizations based on its patented query language VizQL to make compelling charts. This language is nowhere else in the market. c. Agile Data Connections: Tableau has 35+ tuned, live data connections to data sources, plus Tableau supplies a data engine for additional data support right out of the box.

Question 9

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What operating systems does Tableau support?

Answer 9

a. Tableau Desktop: Windows and Mac b. Tableau Server: Windows

Question 10

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What is the difference between these Tableau server products: Server, Online, and Public?

Answer 10

a. Maintenance-Tableau Online(no SLA) and Tableau Public are maintained by Tableau, while Tableau Server is maintained by the customer. b. Data flow- Any data source can connect directly with Tableau Server. Non cloud based data sources must be pushed to Tableau Online via a data extract. c. Security- Data is secure in Tableau Online and Tableau Server. Tableau Online complies with SSAE-16 and US-EU Safer Harbor principles, but is not HIPPA or FERPA compliant. Unless using Public Premium row level data is not protected in Public. d. Licensing-Tableau Server is licensed for the entire server. Tableau Online is licensed by the site. Public and Public premium is licensed by the individual user. e. Authentication- Tableau Public and Online are authenticated via a Tableau generated ID. Server authentication supports authentication or active directory. Server also supports authentication with trusted tickets, or SAML. f. Environment- Tableau Server, Online, and Public are all web based methods of sharing content from Tableau Desktop. Reader is desktop application to open and view content from Tableau Desktop.

Question 11

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What is the difference between these Tableau desktop products: Personal, and Professional?

Answer 11

a. Personal only connects to flat files (Excel, Access, CSV, and Tableau Data Extract.) b. No publishing to Server with personal.

Question 12

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What does maintenance include?

Answer 12

One year of free first come first serve tech support service and upgrades to the next release.

Question 13

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What is data server? How should it be utilized?

Answer 13

Tableau Data Server is a Server component to store and centrally manage reusable data connections. Many workbooks may use one of these data connections. Advantages include reduced network traffic, less processing time, and saving Server space.

Question 14

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What API support does Tableau offer?

Answer 14

a. Tableau Data Extract API- Create a program to bring data from a non-supported data source into Tableau. The program will access, process, and then deliver the data in a TDE file format. b. Javascipt API- Integrate interactive content from Tableau into apps. c. Rest API- Representational State Transfer API. Manage and make requests of Tableau Server via an HTTP interface.

Question 15

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) How do I share results?

Answer 15

Publish secure dashboards to Tableau Server or Tableau Online. A non-secure option is sharing with Tableau Reader.

Question 16

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) Can a customer move from Tableau Online to Tableau Server?

Answer 16

Yes. The products are not mutually exclusive. 12% of Tableau Online customers also deploy a Tableau Server.

Question 17

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What are the licensing models for Tableau Server? Explain the difference.

Answer 17

Core and User based are the two Tableau Server licensing models. Core is restricted by hardware, but has an unlimited user count on the system (including a guest account). User based is restricted by the number of server licenses sold to the customer, but does not have any hardware restrictions.

Question 18

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) Do Tableau products work in a virtual environment?

Answer 18

Yes- they must be configured with the correct operating system and have access to the minimum hardware requirements.

Question 19

(Product Knowledge & Positioning) What languages does Tableau support?

Answer 19

English French German Brazilian Portuguese Spanish Simplified Chinese Korean Japanese

Question 20

(Positioning Data Support) What’s the maximum number of rows Tableau can utilize at one time?

Answer 20

Tableau is not restrained by the number of rows in a table. Customers use Tableau to access petabytes of data because it only retrieves the rows and columns needed to answer your question. Let me share some customer use cases focusing on big data. Example- 100 million rows database. Answer what is the monthly sales trend for the last 2 years? Tableau retrieves 24 rows of data.

Question 21

(Positioning Data Support) I have data from 2+ sources. How does Tableau work with disparate data sources?

Answer 21

Do you want to answer a question that will utilize both sources? a. If yes, then ask if the data has common entries or field name? *If yes, then suggest data blending, a feature unique to Tableau Software. Data blending is when disparate data is queried and then rendered on a single worksheet. The data can only blend on common dimensions and dimension members. Data Blending does not create row level joins and is not a way to add new dimensions or rows to your data. If blending with a cube, a field from the cube must be on the view first to make it the primary data source. Cubes cannot be a secondary data source. *If no, there are some techniques to help compensate for different field names, but the data may need to be cleaned up to complete the analysis. b. If no, then suggest connecting to both sources and create the desired charts.

Question 22

(Positioning Data Support) Can I use a table of data from a website?

Answer 22

Yes. Select the table and paste into a Tableau workbook via ‘Data’ in the toolbar.

Question 23

(Positioning Data Support) What is the Tableau data engine?

Answer 23

It’s an analytical database designed to achieve instant query response, predictive performance, integrate seamlessly into existing data infrastructure, and is not limited to loading entire data sets into memory. The core of the structure is columnar-based that compresses the data.

Question 24

(Positioning Data Support) How do cubes differ from relational database in Tableau?

Answer 24

Most of the application and user experience is the same, but there are a couple of advantages received from each data source type in Tableau. Specifically: Cubes Gain: a. Hierarchical Filters b. Drill Up/Down per Member c. Calculated Members (write your MDX) d. Default Members e. Total Using (set the total to use a different calc than the original field) Relational databases Gain: a. Robust Calculations – even on dimensions b. Groups c. Aggregations (in a cube these are pre-defined) d. Fast Data Engine e. Relative Date Filter f. Row Level Filters

Question 25

(Connecting to Data) What databases can connect to Tableau Desktop and Server?

Answer 25

Tableau supports multiple data connections to one or many data sources concurrently. The data sources can be on premise or in the cloud. I can briefly demo creating a data connection and/or we can walk through connecting to your data in a guided evaluation. What databases are you using currently or are considering in the near future?

Question 26

(Connecting to Data) I don’t see my source of data listed? What are my options?

Answer 26

Use the standard ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) option listed in the data connection window. While this connection option may not be as robust as a native connection, it does provide the ability to use the driver for connecting to your database. If you run into performance issues, I recommend extracting the data into a Tableau Data Extract. We can also provide some guidance to tune the connection. http://kb.tableausoftware.com/articles/knowledgebase/customizing-odbc-connections?lang=en-us You may also use Tableau Data Extract API to write program to access and process your data to create a Tableau Data Extract. We support developers on Windows and Linux platforms for Python/C/C++/Java.

Question 27

(Connecting to Data) What is the difference between ‘Connect Live’ and ‘Extract’?

Answer 27

Connecting live to a database leverages it computational processing and storage. New queries will go to the database and reflect new or updates in the data. An extract will make a static snapshot of the data to be used by Tableau’s data engine. The snapshot of data can be refreshed on a schedule as a whole or incrementally append data. One way to set up these schedules is via Tableau Server.

Question 28

(Connecting to Data) In a live connection, what performance should I expect?

Answer 28

• What are your performance requirements? • Is performance an issue with your current solution or solutions you’re exploring? In a live connection, performance speed is based on how fast your data sources can process requests made by Tableau. If live connection to a data source is too slow, it’s possible to increase performance via a Tableau Data Extract (TDE) in the Tableau’s Data Engine.

Question 29

(Connecting to Data) What is a Tableau Data Extract?

Answer 29

This is Tableau’s own file type, which is a snapshot of the data. A TDE is a powerful analytical tool because it compresses the data pulled from any database and use all parts of a computer’s memory. A TDE can be configured to pull a portion of data based on a condition; roll up granular data to a higher aggregation; or pre-filter data before bringing it into Tableau. http://www.tableausoftware.com/about/blog/2014/7/understanding-tableau-data-extracts-part1

Question 30

(Connecting to Data) Does Tableau support stored procedures?

Answer 30

I know running these subroutines are common, but may I suggest trying Tableau without them first. Often there is better speed performance. If stored procedures are necessary, Tableau supports stored procedures for SAP Sybase, Microsoft SQL Server, and Teradata.

Question 31

(Connecting to Data) I want to write SQL.

Answer 31

To measure performance let’s try a connection where Tableau generated the query. Often custom SQL will fill Tableau Desktop’s cache quicker and slow performance.

Question 32

(Connecting to Data) I can’t connect to my data, help!

Answer 32

Please share the error message you’re receiving with me and Tableau’s technical support. I’ll try to troubleshoot this on the fly, but if I also want to completely solve the issue. Would you mind if I schedule additional support if needed?

Question 33

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How many visualization or chart types are available in Tableau?

Answer 33

The number of chart types, views, and dashboards Tableau can offer is unlimited. We suggest letting our VizQL language help guide your visual analytics choices. Every time a field is dragged and dropped onto the view or “Show Me!” is used, VizQL renders a display using best visual best practices. Do you have a specific chart type to build in mind or would you like to take some example dashboards with you? *There is a collection of demo workbooks that have ~100 chart types in SC-Demo If you decide to buy Tableau, I can also offer you an analytical consulting service.

Question 34

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What is a measure field? What is a dimensional field?

Answer 34

A dimension is a qualitative or categorical field in the data. Dragged into a view, a dimension produces headers in the view. A measure is a quantitative field in the data, meaning that the values in it can be aggregated together and are dependent on how dimension in the view are slicing the values. Measures typically produce and axes. Calculated measures can be qualitative.

Question 35

(Tableau Desktop Demo) Please show me how to make a calculation.

Answer 35

Right click on a field in the data window and select “Create Calculated Field.”

Question 36

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I change the default aggregation of a measure?

Answer 36

Right click on the measure field that is on view card. Then select “Measure(x)” to change the aggregation. If an aggregation is greyed out, extract the data into a TDE.

Question 37

(Tableau Desktop Demo) Show me the capability to drill down into data.

Answer 37

Always ask what kind of drill down a customer is seeking. Tableau provided drill downs in hierarchies, filters, showing the underlying data, and dashboard actions.

Question 38

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What are pivot tables like in Tableau?

Answer 38

Pivot tables in Tableau are crosstabs. Make any view a crosstab by right clicking the view tab and selecting “duplicate as crosstab.” Quick features to show are one click swap in the toolbar or totals on toolbar under the Analysis drop down.

Question 39

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What are the filtering options?

Answer 39

Drag a measure to the filter shelf on the filter view card. Filter by selection, a pattern in the data, a condition, or a relative positioning in the data (top or bottom). Filter time over a date range or relative to a date. Show any filter selection by right clicking and selecting “Show Quick Filter.”

Question 40

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What are the sorting options?

Answer 40

In the view, sort on an axis to sort by quantitative values or on dimensional header to sort alphabetically. You can also manually sort on the view by dragging dimension values into a new order. On the toolbar, use the quick sort buttons. Right click on a dimensional field on view card for more sorting options (sort order & sort by) or clear a sort.

Question 41

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What are the different marks cards?

Answer 41

Color Label Change Chart Type Detail Shape Size Tooltip

Question 42

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What is a tooltip?

Answer 42

A tooltip displays data details when you hover over one or more marks in the view. Use them to see data details that are not in the view. Tool tip quickly filter, remove a selection, or view underlying data. Tooltips may be edited to include both static and dynamic text.

Question 43

(Tableau Desktop Demo) Explain the different shelves.

Answer 43

a. Filter- specifies the values to include in the view. Drill into data. b. Pages- split a view into several pages based on the members of a dimension or the values in a measure. Analyze how a domain within field affects the data or play through a time series. c. Column- drags fields to add columns to the view d. Row- drags fields to add rows to the view.

Question 44

(Tableau Desktop Demo) Maps

Answer 44

Generate maps with latitude and longitude values in your data or with geographic fields Tableau has identified in the data set (signified by a globe in the data window). Double click on the geographic field to create map. Add more map detail by adding more geographic fields to the view. Tableau will map to the zip code. Import your own lats and longs to create a more detailed map at the street level. A mark will render for each set of duo of longitude and latitude. Maps are also available in “Show Me!.”

Question 45

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How are targets or goals added to a chart?

Answer 45

Add a reference line. Right click on an axis. Select “Add Reference Line.” Configure reference line to address the table, pane, or cell. Calculate what the reference should be based upon and how to display. Format the line.

Question 46

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What are the forecasting and trend abilities? *Right click view to add a forecast or trend

Answer 46

Tableau uses exponential smoothing to forecast by finding a regular pattern in the current data to predict future data points. It’s possible to add confidence bands, change the forecast model, adjust for trend, and/or seasonality. Tableau will generate a formula to model the data. Adjusting the model to fit the data is easy, just right click the trend line and select “edit.” Tableaus can create linear, exponential, or polynomial data models. Confidence bands are also available for trend models.

Question 47

(Tableau Desktop Demo) I’d like to bin a measure. What are the options?

Answer 47

a. Right click the measure to bin and select “Create Bin.” b. Select measure to bin. In show me select histogram chart type.

Question 48

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I replace a field on a shelf?

Answer 48

Drag and drop field over the current field on the shelf. The new field will replace the other field.

Question 49

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I show a summary of the view?

Answer 49

Right click in the view. Select “Summary.” The summary card show high level information about a selection of data or the entire data set.

Question 50

(Tableau Desktop Demo) What is Story Points? How does it different from dashboard?

Answer 50

Story Points is a way to build narrative from data; to tell a story. Story Points focuses on providing a platform for story building. Presenting data in this way can lessen time to communicate insight, increase depth of understanding, and increase memory of key concepts. Dashboards are for comparing a monitoring data simultaneously.

Question 51

(Tableau Desktop Demo) Show me how to make a dashboard.

Answer 51

a. Quick click icon on tool bar. Represented by a chart with a plus sign on the right. b. Click new dashboard in in the view and dashboard tabs. c. Select dashboard drop down in the toolbar. Select “new dashboard.” d. Right click on a view or dashboard tab. Select “new dashboard.”

Question 52

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I show an image, webpage, or text in a dashboard?

Answer 52

All of these options available in the dashboard window on the left of the dashboard user interface, below sheets. Drag and drop onto view. Pre select the option to be tiled or floating.

Question 53

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I adjust the size of a dashboard?

Answer 53

Dashboard sizing options are on the left side of the dashboard user interface in the lower right corner. Some sizes for blogs, iPads, and laptops make sizing easy for a certain display medium.

Question 54

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How easy is it to format? Show me an example.

Answer 54

Right click in the view or on a chart on a dashboard to format. Another option is formatting on the marks card. Formatting available includes changing fonts, alignment, shading, borders, lines, size, color, and transparency.

Question 55

(Tableau Desktop Demo) How do I see the underlying or row level data?

Answer 55

a. In a tooltip, select the icon on the most bottom left (represented by columns.) b. In the data window, to the left of the field search, select the columnar icon.

Question 56

(Server) What authentication models do you support?

Answer 56

Tableau Server supports local authentication and active directory authentication. The models are mutually exclusive. To change models, a Tableau Server will need reconfiguration. A Tableau Server can also work with trusted tickets and SAML for a single sign on experience or Kerberos authentication model.

Question 57

(Server) I want to know more about the security of my data if I use Online. Can you tell me where your data warehouse is located and its security protocols?

Answer 57

NO! Tableau does comply with SSAE- 16, LOC Type 1 and US-EU Safe Harbor Principle. We can supply a customer with a copy of the documentation if they sign an NDA.

Question 58

(Server) Is possible to make Tableau Online HIPPA or FERPA compliant for us?

Answer 58

Tableau does not offer that service and according to the contract a customer is not allowed to push sensitive data related to these standards into Tableau Online.

Question 59

(Server) What web browsers is server compatible? Do I need an app?

Answer 59

Tableau Server, Online, and Public are compatible with Android Browser, Internet Explorer, Safari, Mozilla Firefox, and Google chrome for a desktop, laptop, and mobile devices. A free Tableau app is available, but not necessary for server access.

Question 60

(Server) Is it possible to embed the views in Server into another application or a portal?

Answer 60

Yes. It’s possible and easy to embed views into systems like SharePoint or a company portal.

Question 61

(Server) Does Tableau support email bursting or email subscriptions?

Answer 61

Tableau Server and Tableau Online do support email subscriptions sent to your inbox on a schedule. Email bursting is not supported out of the box. It’s possible to set up with febootimail with tabcmd.

Question 62

(Server) Does Tableau support multi-tendancy?

Answer 62

Yes. Tableau accomplishes this through sites.

Question 63

(Server) What is a site?

Answer 63

Sites are independent environments for different organizations or groups on a single server system. Each site’s projects, workbooks, data, and user lists are isolated from those of other sites. A system administrator can only see every site and perform actions such as creating sites and making system-wide changes.

Question 64

(Server) What is a project?

Answer 64

A project is a collection of related workbooks within a site.

Question 65

(Server) What is a group?

Answer 65

A group is a collection of Tableau Server users. Groups make it easier to manage multiple users. Create groups locally on the server or import from Active Directory. Active Directory groups will need to be synced on a regular basis to keep the server up to date.

Question 66

(Server) Is it possible to edit views?

Answer 66

Yes, web authoring allows permissioned users to have a Tableau Desktop light experience for building or editing views.

Question 67

(Server) What is the install for a Tableau Server?

Answer 67

This depends on the installation environment and available hardware. A single server is pretty easy. A cluster is relatively easy as well but will take time to align and configure each server within the cluster. For optimum performance always make sure there is more hardware than the minimum requirements. We recommend a guided evaluation to gain a better understanding of your specific environment. It will decrease deployment time and help us troubleshoot any issues in the future.

Question 68

(Server) What is the general permission model Tableau Server follows?

Answer 68

Tableau follows a cascading permissions model. It will first ask if the user has been explicitly allowed, denied, or inherits permission. If inherited, Tableau will go to the group level and ask the same question. If denied or inherited, the user will not have that permission.

Question 69

(Server) How can monitor performance on a Tableau Server?

Answer 69

The Administrative part of the server provides a maintenance view into the different parts of the server. You can also enable each site to generate server performance reports.

Question 70

(Server) How do I upgrade my server?

Answer 70

We have a simple list of instruction in the Tableau Server Administrator guide or you can contact Tableau for complimentary upgrade service.

Question 71

(Server) I can’t support a server right now, but I’d like to show my colleagues the interface?

Answer 71

We can open a trial on Tableau Online.