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Excel Product function in Tableau
I stumbled across a question on the Tableau forums asking how to write the Excel Product function in Tableau. Full credit for the answer goes to Brian Bell in the comments of this thread https://community.tableau.com/ideas/1857. The Excel Product formula in Tableau is: EXP (SUM( LN ([FieldName]) [...]
How to display non-standard labels in a Tableau line chart
The standard Tableau label options for line charts in give a lot of flexibility. But what if you want to do something non-standard, something that’s not one of the default options? […]
Keep dashboards simple
Within the Tableau community I see many dashboards shared that look great. Often they are highly complex, sometimes like works of art. In reality, in my professional career I have never seen dashboards of that type. Dashboards should be simple. In the commercial environment dashboards are [...]
Tableau format zero values
To format zeroes (0) in Tableau to something else, such as a dash (-) for example, is simple using standard formatting techniques. For example use this technique to not show zero values, simply by formatting zero as a zero length string (“”). In the standard Tableau [...]
Create fixed bins from a measure in Tableau
What feels like a long time ago, pre-Tableau 9, I wrote an article on how to create fixed bins from a measure in Tableau. Back then it was complicated. It required data duplication and data blending. Then Tableau 9 came along and this suddenly creating bins from [...]
Tableau dashboard navigation without the double click
There are use cases where using buttons can aid Tableau dashboard navigation. However a challenge with this approach is the unwanted double click Tableau navigation. For example in your Tableau report you may have a summary dashboard and a detailed drill down. Perhaps you want the [...]
Show the total for selected and unselected values
Recently I came across a chart that showed the total for both the selected and unselected values. It’s actually very simple to create but did take a bit of thought to begin. We want the values NOT selected to remain within the view. A standard filter [...]
MS Access query isn’t in the Tableau table list
Using MS Access in conjunction with Tableau isn’t always a painless experience, especially when it comes to the Access query. You might notice your Access query doesn’t appear in Tableau for you to choose. Alternatively you might find an Access query that returns records in Access returns [...]
Tableau Cannot use boolean type in IF expression
The "Cannot use boolean type in IF expression" error in Tableau calculated fields is quite self-explanatory. In Tableau IF statements you're not able to use boolean fields. Boolean means the value is either TRUE or FALSE. It isn't a numeric value. However there is a workaround [...]
Using Alteryx for Data Quality checks
Data Quality is now a rapidly growing area in many Financial Services organisations. There are multiple vendors, such as Informatica and Ab Initio, with software specifically marketed as a data quality tool. Undoubtedly they are both great products, however they are expensive. It is likely in [...]