Communicating Data with Tableau: Designing, Developing, and Delivering Data Visualizations

by Ben Jones

Overview

Go beyond spreadsheets and tables and design a data presentation that really makes an impact. This practical guide shows you how to use Tableau Software to convert raw data into compelling data visualizations that provide insight or allow viewers to explore the data for themselves.

Ideal for analysts, engineers, marketers, journalists, and researchers, this book describes the principles of communicating data and takes you on an in-depth tour of common visualization methods. You’ll learn how to craft articulate and creative data visualizations with Tableau Desktop 8.1 and Tableau Public 8.1.

• Present comparisons of how much and how many
• Use blended data sources to create ratios and rates
• Create charts to depict proportions and percentages
• Visualize measures of mean, median, and mode
• Lean how to deal with variation and uncertainty
• Communicate multiple quantities in the same view
• Show how quantities and events change over time
• Use maps to communicate positional data
• Build dashboards to combine several visualizations

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781449371982
Publisher:	O'Reilly Media, Incorporated
Publication date:	06/16/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	334
File size:	40 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Ben Jones is an award winning Tableau Public author, and is also the Tableau Public product marketing manager at Tableau Software in Seattle, WA. With over 12 years of experience as an engineer, Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt and Business Analytics manager for a Fortune 500 company, Ben worked on data-driven projects for every department, from facilities to finance.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

1 Communicating Data 1

A Step in the Process 2

A Model of Communication 3

Three Types of Communication Problems 4

Six Principles of Communicating Data 5

Principle #1 Know Your Goal 6

Principle #2 Use the Right Data 7

Principle #3 Select Suitable Visualizations 8

Principle #4 Design for Aesthetics 9

Principle #5 Choose an Effective Medium and Channel 11

Principle #6 Check the Results 13

Summary 13

2 Introduction to Tableau 15

Using Tableau 15

My Tableau Story 16

Tableau Products 16

Connecting to Data 18

The Tableau User Interface 18

Summary 29

3 How Much and How Many 31

Communicating "How Much" 32

An Example of How Much 33

Comparing Comparisons 35

Fine-Tuning the Default 36

Sorting 37

The Dot Chart 39

Communicating "How Many" 42

A Tale of Two Formats 43

Counting Dimensions 43

Histograms: How Many of How Much? 46

Summary 50

4 Ratios and Rates 51

Ratios 52

Two Ways of Adding Rank 60

Rates 63

Blending Data Sources 64

Visualizing Rates 65

Summary 67

5 Proportions and Percentages 69

Part-to-Whole 69

Introducing Filters and Quick Filters 71

Introducing Table Calculations 74

Proportions as Waterfall Charts Using Gantt 79

Current-to-Historical 82

The Bullet Graph 82

Reference Lines 84

Actual-to-Target 85

Summary 86

6 Mean and Median 87

The Normal Distribution 88

An Example of "Normal" Data 89

Box Plots 90

An Example of "Non-Normal" Data 96

Sensitivity to Outliers 97

Visualizing Typical Values of Non- Normal Distributions 98

Summary 99

7 Variation and Uncertainty 101

Respecting Variation 101

Visualizing Variation 104

Variation Over Time: Control Charts 106

Anatomy of a Control Chart 107

How to Create a Control Chart in Tableau 107

Understanding Uncertainty 115

Summary 123

8 Multiple Quantities 125

Scatterplots 126

Who Is Who? 130

Making it Exploratory 134

Adding Background Images 136

Stacked Bars 137

Regression and Trend Lines 141

The Quadrant Chart 146

Summary 148

9 Changes Over Time 149

The Origin of Time Charts 150

The Line Chart 151

The Dual-Axis Line Chart 154

The Connected Scatterplot 158

The Date Field Type and Seasonality 162

The Timeline 166

The Slopegraph 171

Step 1 Get live Data 171

Step 2 Connect Tableau 172

Step 3 Create a Parameter and Matching Calculated Field 172

Step 4 Create the Basic Slopegraph 174

Step 5 Add Line Coloring and Thickness 175

Step 6 Design the Dashboard 178

Summary 179

10 Maps and Location 181

One Special Map 182

Circle Maps 183

Adding a Second Encoding 185

When Marks Multiply 186

Filled Maps 190

Dual-Encoded Maps 196

A Dual-Axis Map 197

A Dual-Encoded Circle Map 199

Summary 201

11 Advanced Maps 203

Maps with Shapes 204

Maps Showing Paths 211

Plotting Map Shapes Using Axes 216

Summary 223

12 The Joy of Dashboards 225

Dashboards in Tableau 226

A Word of Caution 228

"Begin with the End in Mind" 229

Types of Dashboards 230

Context Is King 235

Summary 238

13 Building Dashboards 239

Building an Exploratory Dashboard 243

Step 1 Design 243

Step 2 Sheets 243

Moving Things Around 248

Step 3 Annotations 250

Step 4 Objects 253

Step 5 Actions 258

Step 6 Formatting 270

Steps 7 and 8 Delivery and Results 271

Building an Explanatory Dashboard 272

A Key Point to Explain: Nordic Countries in the Lead 272

Another Key Point to Explain: The Emergence of China 274

Summary 275

14 Advanced Dashboard Features 277

Animating Dashboards 278

Showing Multiple Tabs 282

Adding Navigation with Filters 285

Adding Custom Header Images 290

Adding Google Maps to Dashboards 292

Create the URLs 294

Adding Dynamic Google Maps Satellite Images to Our Dashboard 295

Adding YouTube Videos to Dashboards 297

Summary 302

A Resources 303

Index 305