Ten Tiny Tableau Tips
My career went from Tableau being a supplemental part of my reporting responsibilities to my full-time role. Now that I spend almost all day every day of the workweek in it and do it recreationally, I’ve picked up a trick or two to make my workflow more efficient and quick. None of these are groundbreaking but I think all are good things to add to your tool belt if you plan on spending a lot of time in the platform. And most of these are either things where I’ve thought ‘wait, you can do that?’ or have had people say similar sentiments when I’m demo-ing something on a video. Without further ado, here are ten tiny tableau tips.
Note: My work computer is a PC on 2020.2 and my personal computer is a Mac on 2020.4. Some of the controls may be different but I am fairly sure I’ve used them on both computers. I apologize if some of the tips are only available on newer versions of Tableau.
1. Apply Button
Click the ‘Apply’ button in the bottom of the calc window instead of ‘OK’
What It Does: Changes the calculated field in the view without closing the calculated field window
Why I Do It: Maybe some of y’all absolute Tableau rockstars get all your calcs right the first time but not me. When I’m troubleshooting a calc using this saves me a lot of time of clicking ‘Ok’, realizing it didn’t do what I thought it was going to, and opening it back up again.
BONUS: After posting this on my LinkedIn someone told me you can achieve this on your keyboard with Ctril + Enter.
2. Drag & Replace
Drag a pill on top of another in your view
What It Does: Replaces the pill that was previously in that spot
Why I Do It: There are two places I do this the most and for two different reasons. One of them is on the filter shelf. If I’m dealing with a lot of data, removing a filter takes processing time. And then adding a filter takes processing time. But if I drag a pill on top of pill on the shelf it will only process once. The other place I use this the most is on text. I do it here because it PRESERVES THE FORMATTING. Think for example that you have a KPI sheet for Sales and you want to make an identical sheet for Profit. If you pull Sales off text then put Profit on, you’ll need to reformat the text and likely the order. If you duplicate the sheet and drag the Profit pill on top of the Sales pill, all the formatting and positioning stays the same. It’s a time saver in any way you use it though. Even if you’re just replacing what’s on color, why remove one and put another on when you can do it in one step?
3. Bring Dimensions in as Measures
Select option (Mac) / right-click (PC) while dragging the pill into the view.
What It Does: Brings a dimension in as a measure
Why I Do It: Raise your hand if you’ve had to do count distinct of an ID or a country! You could add it to the view and then change it but if you have 70,000 employee IDs (not uncommon) that might be a bit much. This brings it in as a measure and bobs your uncle.
4. Ad Hoc Calcs
Double click on your marks card or columns/row shelf to make a new calc
What It Does: Creates a measure that only exists in your view
Why I Do It: Sometimes you just need to validate your work or you want to try out a couple of methods out. This is an easy way to work through some things without the process of making and updating a calc. I will express caution here that this should be used sparingly for actual analysis that will stay in your dashboard. But it’s great on the fly or for small things like labels. Bonus: if you decide you would like this to be a permanent calc later for reuse, just shift+drag it to the data panel.
5. Naming Ad Hoc Calcs
At the top of the calc put two forward slashes and a name in front of your calc
What It Does: Provides a proper name for your ad hoc calcs
Why I Do It: The default name for an ad hoc calc is whatever the actual calculation is. If you’re leaving this in your viz, it’s not very pretty. It can also be pretty hard to understand/remember based on that alone. But you can give them a name similar to an actual field by typing //WhateverNameYouWant at the top of the ad hoc calc and hitting shift+enter.
6. Renaming Dimensions/Measures
Select ‘Edit in Shelf’ then type two forward slashes with the new name at the top of the pill window
What It Does: Makes an ‘Alias’ for the field in your view
Why I Do It: Two reasons. First, sometimes data comes in with long or unsightly names. I don’t always want to change these though because I like having the actual name of the field in the data in case I need to reference it in conversation. But it doesn’t always look great in a view. Similarly, sometimes I make a calculated field where I want the calc name to be specific such as ‘Rank | Sales for 2020’ but may just want it to say ‘Rank’ on the dashboard. This also allows you to have multiple fields with the same name. For example, ‘Rank | Sales for 2020’ and ‘Rank | Profit for 2020’ can both be named ‘Rank’ on their sheets. Just be careful that you know what these are and the viewers do as well.
7. Aliases (It’s Not What You Think)
Open the Aliases window to see contents
What It Does: Allows you to change the way a value in a dimension is displayed
Why I Do It: The ‘what’ was probably a little misleading. This tip isn’t actually about creating aliases. What I use aliases for often is checking what values a dimension contains without pulling it into my view. I think we’ve probably all dealt with data where several dimensions are closely named or maybe not as descriptive as we’d like. Or sometimes we just need to check really quickly the spelling of something to include in a calculation. I use aliases often to quickly pull up a window of the values in a way that’s a lot quicker than adding it to my sheet.
8. Flexible Worksheet Layout
Click and drag cards around the view or hide ones you don’t need
What It Does: Allows you to customize the placement of cards on your worksheet
Why I Do It: Because I’m weird mainly. I always hide the pages card. Let’s start there. I think I’ve used it twice in my life and it’s just taking up real estate. But sometimes I want my legend under my marks card. Or the parameter control. And sometimes I even put my filters card on the right. CRAZY I KNOW. It was quite some time before I realized you can move these because people don’t talk about it that much (you can even move the rows and columns shelf but I’m not that wild). But it’s nice to customize this for what works for you or that sheet.
9. Grid View of Sheets
What It Does: Allows you to see all the sheets in the workbook at once
Why I Do It: Sometimes I just cannot find what I want. It’s that simple. And having the thumbnails allows me to quickly see everything and navigate to the sheet I want.
10. Peekaboo Calcs
Click inside the calculated field name to show the calculation in the side window
What It Does: Allows you to see a calculation that’s embedded in another calc in the side window
Why I Do It: My memory is only good when I don’t need it. I know every song lyric that I’ve ever heard and yet somehow I can’t remember the calc I just made. But in reality, it’s nice when you’re building up a calculation with multiple fields to be able to reference one without actually closing the one you’re in and opening the other. I also use this as a little cheat if I need to see the calc even when I don’t intend on using it in the current one I’m writing.
P.S. I don’t know if these have an actual name but this is what I call them.
