Latest news on Tableau 7.0 from the 2011 Tableau data visualisation conference in Las Vegas
There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning.
– Raoul Duke in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Unlike Raoul, there hasn't been much winning on the tables of Vegas so far but, no doubt, my luck's gonna change soon! Where's that ATM again ...
So anyway, the 2011 Tableau customer conference is coming to an end at the Encore Casino, Las Vegas and your faithful Datalicious correspondent has been there to see it all (and I mean ALL of it).
For Tableau, it has been a chance to showcase their new releases of Desktop and Server (both due in January). More on that below. For customers, it has been a great opportunity to meet the 300 strong team (all that was left back in Seattle was an answering machine), and learn about features (old and new) that we can use to pimp our vizzes.
Tableau 7.0
I’m not going to list everything they’ve changed since 6.1 because there's stacks but here are the best bits:
- Tableau Server will have a separate repository for datasets that can be automatically refreshed. Essentially, this means that the ‘keepers of the data’ can easily build and share ‘nice’ datasets with the people who need to build the reports and do the analyses. No drivers or database passwords required. It’s another big step to putting more data into the hands of the people who want answers to their business questions.
- A “replace with new dataset” function. This is my favourite because quite often we build and develop dashboards in prototype form based on some sample Excel data, only to have to rebuild the dashboard once the data warehouse is built and Tableau is connected live. With this new feature, all we’ll need to do is switch in the database for the Excel at the click of a button and bam!
- And for all you Excel perverts out there, area charts now come standard. Still no guages though ;)
We’ve got our hands on the beta version of 7.0 and look forward to demonstrating the new features with some vizzes over the coming weeks.
Also big thanks to Dirk and Ross, two Tableau Doctors who sorted out some really nasty Tableau table calculations that’ll help us build an interactive media attribution engine.
Adios amigos
