This is a guide to installing and running Tableau Desktop on your personal computer. Please note that all workstations in the Digital Studio (on the second floor of O'Neill Library) already have Tableau Desktop installed.
Tableau has versions for both Windows and Mac. Detailed system requirements for Tableau here: https://public.tableau.com/en-us/s/download.
Tableau Desktop is a visualization software used to create data visualizations and interactive dashboards. If you are a student, instructor, or researcher, you can request a free, renewable, one-year license for Tableau Desktop through Tableau Academic Program. For instructor and researcher, the individual license is valid for one year and can be renewed each year if you are teaching Tableau in the classroom or conducting non-commercial academic research; The student license expires after one year; you can request a new license each year as a full-time student.
If you are a member of the public, please consider using Tableau Public instead, which is the free version of Tableau Desktop.
Here are the steps for students: (Installation process for instructors and researchers is similar. Just follow the instructions on the screen.)
Step 1: Go to https://www.tableau.com/academic/students (Here is the link for instructors.)
Tableau Student
Step 2: Click on Get Tableau for Free.
Step 3: A web form will pop up. Complete all of the requested information, using your official BC email address when you fill out the form.
Step 4: Next, click on Verify Student Status.
Step 5: You will receive an email with a product key and link to download the software.
Step 6: Click on Download Tableau Desktop from your email and copy the product key.
Step 7: Follow the installation instructions to install Tableau to your computer.
Step 8: Activate your Tableau with your license key.
For instructor and researcher, click on Request Individual License on the screen.
The pop up request form is similar to the student one described above, but additionally asks "I plan to use Tableau Desktop for..." Under that popup, you can select "Teaching only," "Noncommercial academic research only," or both. Select the option that fits your needs best. You do not need to be an instructor to get a Tableau copy.
Tableau Public
Following are the general steps to download Tableau Public:
Go to Tableau Public Download Page:
Enter your email address and click "Download the App".
Once the installation file has been downloaded to your computer, run it and follow the prompts to install Tableau on your Mac or PC.
Join the Tableau Community Forums to find solutions for what you need to accomplish. Ask questions to receive help and feedback.
Get inspired by the many interactive visualizations in the Visual Gallery. Download the workbooks to play with on Tableau Desktop
Tableau training: How-to Videos
Lynda.com --Lynda.com has a great variety of training videos about Tableau.
Note: Lynda.com can be accessed with a Boston Public Library Card. Anyone residing in the state of Massachusetts can apply for a free e-library card. Once you have a Boston Public Library account, you can use your credentials to log in.
More reading about data visualization:
The Big Book of Dashboards
Visual Reporting and Analysis: Seeing is Knowing Whitepaper
Visual Analysis Best Practices: A Guidebook Whitepaper
Data Storytelling: Using visualization to share the human impact of numbers Whitepaper
Beautiful Evidence – Edward Tufte
Information Dashboard Design – Stephen Few
Information Visualization – Colin Ware
The Tableau COVID-19 Data Hub contains resources to help people visualize and analyze the most recent data on the coronavirus outbreak.
In this tutorial, we will learn:
How to connect data to Tableau
How to create worksheets
How to create an interactive dashboard
How to save and publish your visualization
In this tutorial, we will work the COVID-19 data from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control website.
Data preview in Excel:
The data fields are described below:
Startup Tableau desktop, you will get the start page showing various data sources. Under the “Connect” on the left side of the screen, you have options to connect to a file or server data source. Under to a File, choose Text file. Then navigate to the CSV file you just download from the last step:
At the bottom of the Tableau desktop, click on a sheet (sheet 1) and you will see the following screen:
Tableau automatically separates the data into Dimensions and Measures. Dimensions are the categorical fields. Measures are the quantitative fields, such as death count, positive cases count
We will create a bar chart tracking number of new positive cases per day. Drag “People Positive New Cases” from Measures and drop it into the “Rows” section. Drag" Report Date" from Dimensions to "Columns". Select “Days” from the shortcut menu.
Note that it defaults to YEAR(Date). To format how the date is displayed, right-click on YEAR(Date) and select Day, specifically the option that has the example "8th May, 2015".
We can also add some filters to the bar chart so that a user could filter to see a certain country or date range. From Dimensions, drag Country Short Name to the Filters shelf. Click on All and then OK.
Next, right-click on the Country Short Name on the Filters shelf and select Show Filter. Now you will see a list of countries on the right.
Double click on Sheet 1, rename the worksheet title to "New Positive Cases"
Next, we will create a map. First, open a new workbook, double click "Country Short Name", Tableau has placed the longitude and latitude coordinates in the columns and rows, respectively, a point map will show on the design canvas.
Drag and drop "People Positive Cases Count" to Size under Marks.
Double click on Sheet 2, rename the worksheet title to "New Positive Cases by Country"
Now we will create the third worksheet, open a new worksheet.
We’ll create a vertical bar chart tracking confirmed case per country.
Drag “People Positive Cases Count” from measures and drop it into the “Columns” section. Drag Country Short Name from Dimensions to "Measures".
Go to the bottom of the chart and click on the sorting icon. Sort the number of positive cases in descending order.
Go to Marks, you customize the chart color by using the color pilates.
Name the worksheet “Positive Cases by Country.”
Let’s create a dashboard to pull all of these visualizations together. The dashboard will combine our three visuals we have made in the previous steps. Click on the new dashboard icon at the bottom of the page to create a new dashboard.
Our three worksheets are on the left. Drag “worksheet 1" into the drop area on the right.
Combine 3 worksheets:
Starter Kit for Text Analysis
https://www.kenflerlage.com/2019/09/text-analysis.html
Search for “Digital Humanities” in Tableau Public
https://public.tableau.com/en-us/search/all/digital%20humanities
3 Easy Steps to Make Graphs
https://digitalhumanities.berkeley.edu/blog/17/06/26/3-easy-steps-make-graphstableau
Add Image of Google Maps and OpenStreetMap as Background Images in Tableau https://help.tableau.com/current/pro/desktop/en-gb/bkimages_maps.htm
U.S. Census Bureau Vizzes
