For anyone attending a Tableau training on the second day, we will often teach how to create a Top N filter. This is a very commonly used tip by Tableau authors. Often the analysis asks us to filter the data by the top performers and to allow our end users to decide which N they want to see.

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Sometimes, though, we will want to give the end users some extra flexibility. Instead of seeing just the top performers, we want to also allow them to select the bottom ones.

To do that, we just need to follow three steps:

• Create a String parameter allowing the end user to select Top or Bottom
• Create a calculation like the one below
• Add the calculated field to the Filter shelf and set it to True

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What the calculation does is to look for the Top/Bottom parameter, and if it is the Top, then a Boolean field will show true for all the all the values equal or lower than the number in the Top N. (-Sales) inverts the values and therefore filters for the top values, considering that we are now looking at negative values.

In the view, however, we keep the Sales and not the negative values.

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This is a very quick tip that I hope you find useful. You can see how it works in the actual Tableau dashboard below. Thank you for reading.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US! We’re officially two years old. Thank you for being a part of our community for the past two years. We have some exciting updates to the show that we’ll implement in upcoming episodes, the first being our new panel format.

Brad Fair and Mat Hughes join host Robert Rouse to talk about Tableau performance, what it means to be “fast,” the different ways to measure performance and some practical steps to getting better performance. Hit us up on Twitter @interworks with questions and feedback.

Subscribe to Podcast Your Data through iTunes, Stitcher, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcasting app.

Gartner recently released their annual BI Magic Quadrant, which shows the top players in the BI space and ranks them in relation to each other. InterWorks partner Tableau Software is perennially in the Leader category, and this year is no exception. In fact, both Tableau and Microsoft Power BI greatly outpaced others in the market. You can get the full report from Tableau here.

Rankings Over Time in Tableau

While the Magic Quadrant does a good job of evaluating platforms on their ability to execute and their completion of vision, it's important to take any rankings with a grain of salt. It's also important to take into account ranking history over multiple years. This inspired me to use Tableau to create a dashboard showing the history of BI Magic Quadrant rankings for the past seven years. You can explore the dashboard below. Be sure to click through the different tabs to see the rankings broken down in different ways.

March Madness is upon us once again! As is tradition, I've applied my knowledge of data with my love of hoops to update two March Madness data visualizations in Tableau. These dashboards are largely the same as previous years, only with new data and a few tweaks. I include a little more background on how I built them in my old posts from 2016 and 2017 if you're curious, but below you'll find the basic explanation for each dashboard.

Dashboard #1: Predicting March Madness

To work this dashboard, all you have to do is plug in any two teams to get their stats and the predicted outcome of that matchup. This viz might come in handy as you fill our your brackets. Beyond updating the data, I gave the dashboard a fresh, mobile look. 

Dashboard #2: Round of 64 Game Schedule

This dashboard shows games being played throughout the day so you can choose which TV networks to prioritize or turn sound on for. Maybe I'm the only person on Earth who does that, but hey, it's useful for me. Again, the data has been updated for 2018, including KenPom predictions and thrill scores in Tableau tooltips.

Living in one of the most populated cities in the country, San Francisco comes with many perks. There is an endless number of events, unique neighborhoods around every corner and good public transportation. Of course, with so many people living and visiting in such a confined city, public amenities are bound to become broken, dirty or in need of replacing. This is where San Francisco’s 311 service comes handy. 

“311” is a non-emergency service offered by many major cities in the U.S. It is a method for visitors and residents to report issues they see around the city or to communicate with government entities. Most commonly, residents will report a broken streetlight or overflowing trashcan. But in cities like San Francisco, it can also give you a direct line to the mayor’s office to provide feedback on city services. This makes it a powerful communication tool.

The Data

As a resident of the city, I was particularly interested to learn more about my neighborhood and the areas around the city where I spend my time. Since 311 is a government service, all its data is open to the public, which gives us a tremendous amount of insight about the city, what its infrastructure issues are and how it handles these requests. The 311 data is published on its open data site. 

The data set itself is massive with several hundred thousand calls logged each year for the last eight years. Among other data points, the location of the issue is recorded along with the day/time the request is submitted and resolved. I decided to include data from 2017 for optimal dashboard performance. There was some data cleansing needed to normalize request categories, improve formatting and remove duplicate entries. By limiting the data to 2017, I was able to accomplish this easily in Excel.

The Dashboard

Once the data was prepped, I was able to connect it to Tableau Desktop and begin creating the visualization. Since San Francisco residents identify with their neighborhoods, I wanted to slice the data visually by neighborhood. Luckily, the 311 data site also contained a spatial file, and I was able to join the two data sources (check out this blog from Robert for more on how joins work) to provide a neighborhood overlay of the city map. 

With over 500,000 individual calls to 311 and over 100 different request types, the dashboard is limited to shop the top five types of requests, which covers the vast majority of each service category. For functionality, I opted for an action icon and an interactive map so users could filter the data to the specific service type and neighborhood of interest. 

It was particularly interesting to see how the volume of calls and types of requests varied from each neighborhood. I found it fascinating, and I hope you will to! Explore the dashboard below:

There’s a unifying thread among InterWorks employees that you might have noticed in blogs, tweets, Facebook posts and more: We really like this company, we really like the people we work with and we really like all the amazing stuff we get to do each day. And the amazing stuff I get to do each day?

My job is to bring InterWorks to Australia and New Zealand. Our focus is helping companies leverage their data for actionable intelligence and insights. The good news is that InterWorks, from humble beginnings in a small university town in Oklahoma, has spread across the United States and Europe while maintaining the same commitment to the vision of our consultancy. My path for success, my blueprint, is one that has proven its worth again and again.

Step one? Rambo.

Phase I: Rambo

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer.”

- Harriet Tubman

Whether it’s client work that brings us into a market or we make a strategic choice to discover new lands, typically it starts with a single person. A single person with a lot of passion about building something. Back in 1997, that person was Behfar, our founder and CEO.

In the early days, we looked different. We did different type of work. The one thing that was the same back then as it is today in every InterWorks office around the world is that we have a commitment to our work, our clients and our team that has never changed. Now this plan falls apart if you don’t send in the right person.

Enter Rambo.

“You don't seem to want to accept the fact you're dealing with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best, with guns, with knives, with his bare hands. A man who's been trained to ignore pain, ignore weather, to live off the land, to eat things that would make a billy goat puke.”

- Colonel Trautman

I promise this is not part of InterWorks onboarding process. We save the torture for Oklahoma Freewheel.

There are three secrets to InterWorks. First, we only hire people that we think are amazing (and I mean amazing). Not just good. Not the best available. Amazing. Imagine what you could do with a collective of truly amazing people? That’s the whole experiment. Every single person at InterWorks is Rambo – from Alyscia in accounting to trainer Steph K. to Matt in account management. Don’t believe me? Here it is directly from our CEO: It’s Hell Yes or No.

Here’s the second secret: Rambo isn’t actually alone. There are a ton of people behind the scenes from that one consultant or technician that you might see onsite. What do I mean? Let’s take my own example. I was made into a Tableau consultant by the care and commitment of our enablement team – Carly and Katie just to name a few. I like to write blog articles, so Garrett and MKTG take my chicken scratch and make it work. Any questions I have on data, networking, Tableau Server, Jamaican rum, cooking recipes, Game of Thrones fan theories – I have 200+ experts ready to help.

There are so many people eager to help with so much knowledge, because … yep, you guessed it: They’re amazing!

And now for my final secret: I never really notice how hard I’m working because I’m having the time of my life doing it. I had a dream that I made into a goal. I wanted to bring InterWorks to Australia. InterWorks empowered me to chase that dream. This has been such an amazing adventure and I’m doing it with such an inspiring collection of people, many of whom are among my closest friends.

Phase II: Voltron

“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."

- Isaac Newton

Rambo has been doing Rambo things. Phase I has been working perfectly. We’ve been doing the hard yakka all over the country, building opportunities and converting prospects into clients. There’s a critical mass now. It’s time to build a team on the ground.

Now that’s not as easy as it sounds. Our hiring process takes a lot of time and energy as you might guess. We’re only looking for Rambos in every position. Bringing people together isn’t easy, either. Teams can go tragically wrong in two basic directions.

The first is that only a few people do amazing things and everyone else stays under the radar. The second is when you have a lot of amazing people, but they don’t hear the same music. They don’t dance to the same beat. When you have five individuals all doing their own things, often they work to each other’s detriment rather than benefit.

That’s why we’ve gotta go full Voltron.

Individually, each of the robot lions is quite impressive. They have teeth, lasers and a boss paint job. Against their greatest challenges though, all five lions might fight side by side and still not have enough to win. Only when they completely commit into forming one thing, when they form Voltron, do they realize their full power and potential.

That’s when they are unbeatable.

This takes time and investment. That’s why InterWorks spends so much effort on building friendships, bonds and memories within the team. I loved seeing new employees have their light bulb moment at our 2018 week-long holiday party back in the United States. Yeah, I said week-long. Kickball tournaments, bowling night, wine bars, karaoke, feasts, Sunday breakfasts, the gangsta-rap party bus and more. I routinely have people come to me during the final night at our big celebration flabbergasted. They can’t believe that a company like this actually exists.

Well, it does, and not by accident.

Behfar (CEO) and Staci (CFO) spend a lot more time and love than other companies do on the little extras. If you judged your company by a collection of spreadsheets, these expenditures would be the first to be cut. Not at InterWorks. Why? Because they know that’s how you get Voltron Force. That’s how you take amazing people and make them into a “One” rather than a “Many.”

What’s Next?

“Surrender? Don’t be bloody silly, we’re Australian."

- Anonymous ANZAC Soldier

InterWorks is in Australia. It’s with a great deal of joy and pride that I write that. From the Rambo days to Voltron, it’s been a pleasure to find so many people in the Tableau and data community both as colleagues, partners and clients. We’re taking the essential aspects of our business, the things that make us special, and combining them with the Australian character to create something unique.

Our goal is not to be the biggest. Our goal is to be the best. If that means that we grow, then great. Growth will never be the goal in and of itself. If you need a Voltron, let us know. Our amazing consultants are implementing amazing solutions with data every day from Melbourne to Sydney to Perth to Brisbane and everywhere in between. There’s no one better.

And maybe, just maybe, I can get Behfar and Staci to add a cricket match to next year’s holiday party.

Join the Team!

We are looking for space lions to join our cosmic defender robot. If you’re driven by data, have an energy that contagious and an earnestness for doing awesome stuff, then we would love to chat. Check our Careers for exciting opportunities throughout Australia.

Do you suffer from an irrational fear of robots, drones or mechanical sentient beings? Do you get anxiety when you think of the phrase, “artificial intelligence,” see someone dancing with quick and jerky motions or hear the theme song to "The Jetsons?" If so, you may have a disorder named "robophobia." You should probably visit a medical professional, and you definitely should not read any further.

On the other hand, if the things above excite you, then we’ve got some good news.

Portals for Tableau have gotten a little bit smarter. They haven’t gained sentience yet, nor have they become evil and started preparing to take over the world, but they will now check which version of the REST API your Tableau Server supports and update their settings accordingly. As long as your Tableau Server is version 10.1 or above, a portal will be able to determine which version of the API it should be using, both when you’re first configuring it and as your Tableau Server is upgraded going forward.

Initial Setup

As soon as you enter your Tableau Server URL, username, password and site details, the portal will reach out to the server and update the version drop-down for you. At the same time, it will also verify the user you entered is either a server or site administrator of the specified site, which should help alleviate any of those hard-to-track-down dashboard permission issues.

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Tableau Server Upgrades

When Tableau Server is upgraded, it is easy to forget to update that tiny setting in the portal to take advantages of the new features. Portals for Tableau have you covered there too. On a weekly basis, your portal will reach out to the Tableau Server again to see if it has been upgraded. If it sees that it’s a newer version supported by the portal, it will automatically change the setting without you having to lift a finger.

Portals for Tableau may not be real robots, but they are here to make your life easier.

We’re thrilled to announce that InterWorks is officially a Dataiku partner! Dataiku is a collaborative data science platform designed to reduce the time and effort it takes to use data science applications in a business setting. We’re excited about the potential Dataiku can have for our clients, and we’re already nerding out over all the fantastic features found in this robust platform.

“Data science is no longer reserved exclusively for advanced analytics teams. Clients of all shapes and sizes are now understanding the real-world impact it can have on their businesses, and they want in. That’s why we like Dataiku so much – it makes the application of data science models practical and approachable, giving clients deep insight without overcomplexity. “

- Behfar Jahanshahi, CEO, InterWorks

Data Science Demystified

There’s a lot of buzz and hype about topics like data science and machine learning, but it’s really nothing new. It’s also not near as scary as it sounds. Data science is simply applying scientific principles to your data. In fact, you might be more familiar with these principles than you think.

In a business sense, data science is extremely useful. It can take you beyond surface-level analysis and provide deeper insight into your business operations. Traditional analysis can take you a long way, but data science goes beyond telling you “what’s happened” and into the realm of “what will happen next?” It’s this predictive capability that makes data science so useful in business decisions.

What Does Dataiku Do?

The truth is that are very few unicorn data scientists in the world. Though brilliant, many are in high demand, which means they demand premium salaries. Don’t fret. All is not lost. In fact, that’s where Dataiku aims to help.

Dataiku features an exhaustive list of data science and data preparation features. The purpose is to serve as a one-stop shop for these initiatives. With the power to consolidate your data science and preparation workflows into one place, you can save a ton of time and money. Beyond consolidation, it gives you the ability to build and monitor your models from start to finish in an easy-to-understand, visual interface.

On the data preparation side, Dataiku can connect virtually any source you desire. These connections allow to forego the manual extraction of data from one place into another. Once connected, Dataiku then allows you to clean your data in a fast and intuitive way. The best part is that once you find your flow, you can automate the whole process from data mining to data source creation.

Who Should Use Dataiku?

Perhaps one of our favorite things about Dataiku is its utility to a wide range of users. Because it was built for collaboration, it’s great for data science teams that are looking for a unified workflow. Its slick interface makes it comparable to a modern project management tool, only with the power of an exhaustive data science and data preparation toolbelt. Of course, the lone data scientist can also get considerable value from Dataiku, simply by the virtue of being able to use one tool in place of a dozen. Hey, that’s just math, and we know how much data folks love math.

Let’s Talk More

If we’ve piqued your interest with the idea of streamlined data science with Dataiku, we’d love to talk more with you about it. Whether you’re new to data science or simply looking for a better way, we think it has the potential to be a game-changer. Drop us a line to see how Dataiku can fit into your data ecosystem.

Contact Us

About a month ago, we created a Podcast Your Data! episode about Tableau user groups (TUGs) where Dan Murray hosted Andy Piper (one of the leaders of Atlanta TUG), Kent Sloan (Oklahoma City TUG) and myself (co-leader of The Netherlands TUG). During our discussion, we compared different TUG’s across the globe.

Of course, all TUGs are different: Some user groups are smaller (20-50 people) and some have hundreds of participants per event. The agenda can look different, as well. However, passionate people who like to share their knowledge is what all these user groups have in common, apart from the fact that they are mostly Tableau related.

So, if you haven’t attended a TUG yet, below are three reasons why you should consider it. I have also added some tips on how to start your own TUG at the end of the article.

1. Learn

TUGs are great places to learn something new about Tableau and data visualization in general! The agenda and setup from one user group to another will differ. For instance, some TUGs offer Tableau Doctor sessions where you can ask your questions to more advanced users. Other TUGs offer “tips and tricks” sessions or presentations where you can learn handy features or how to build something cool and interesting from other attendees.

As an example, a Dutch TUG will host a well-known Makeover Monday event this March. Tableau evangelist Andy Kriebel will show a visualisation and provide a dataset to work on. The participants will then have an hour to build their own version of the viz which should be an improvement on the original. By the end of the hour, there will be a demonstration of created vizzes and joint discussions with suggestions for improvement. You can register to attend the event here.

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Above: Elissa Fink presenting at a London TUG event.

If you are lucky enough, you can sometimes spot someone senior from Tableau presenting at a user group event. While attending London TUG last year, Francois Aljenstat (Tableau Chief Product Officer) presented the 2018 roll-out map, Elissa Fink (Tableau Chief Marketing Officer) gave a presentation about technology adoption and Andy Cotgreave (Tableau's Technical Evangelism Director and co-author of “The Big Book of Dashboards”) presented some interesting insights about dashboards. Here is a short summary from those events.

Adam Selipsky (Tableau CEO) has also stopped by to greet TUG attendees, and Ervin van Laar (Tableau Product Consultant) came to present features from Tableau 10.5 at our event in December. Everyone in the room took value from those visits. To sum it up, attending a TUG gives you invaluable insight into the future of Tableau and you will always take away something new.

2. Meet and Get Inspired

Attending a Tableau User Group is a great opportunity to meet like-minded people who have similar interests and passions and who are probably tackling similar problems/challenges. These people can be from completely different industries, and having conversations with them can broaden your horizons. It is always great fun to exchange your experience and thoughts, and you may even learn from each other. Networking plays an important and valuable part at these events, you never know who you will meet: a new friend, future colleague, a customer or one of Tableau’s own senior representatives.

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Above: Networking and food at a TUG meeting.

3. Contribute and Improve

One of the greatest things about these events is that if you are interested, you can contribute to the community. You may have an interesting story to share, a resolution to a problem you have encountered and you can become so empowered by the group that you become a co-leader of the TUG! Anything is possible, just be proactive!

TUGs can also be a great playground to practice and develop your presentation skills. Furthermore, you can apply your project management skills in case you will be hosting an event or become a co- leader. Use your creativity and bring something completely new or invite a speaker who you always wanted to meet.

If you don’t have Tableau User Group in your area, you can start one. Below are the links that can help you.

• Here is the application form to start a new user group. One of Tableau representatives will reach out to you.
• User Group Best Practices Document
• Agenda Library
• Here is the sign-up form to join the community in your area.

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Above: There is always plenty of swag at TUG events.

TUG Shoutouts

One last thing: We mentioned these user groups during our podcast conversation. I want to share their information in case you happen to be form those locations.

It's the combination of everything coming together perfectly: a glorious blend of texture, aroma and taste. It is a beverage bordering on the divine that represents the purest essence of coffee. It is an espresso shot that tastes as good as freshly roasted coffee smells. For coffee aficionados, it's something to strive for and an experience to savor. If you are lucky, every one out of 100 shots will contain the right blend of factors to create this magical experience.

It is the “God Shot.”

So, why am I telling you this on a data blog? Besides the fact that my two great obsessions in life are coffee and data, I think we can learn a lot from the way we make great coffee and apply it to how we create great analysis. So, let's dig a little deeper.

3 Keys to Great Espresso

There are three major factors to consider when trying to make great espresso (or any coffee for that matter). You have the beans, the grind and the espresso machine. It's easy to focus on the first and last steps. After all, we all know that garbage in equals garbage out, so we'll spend money on quality beans. And that last step? Who doesn't get excited by sleek machines that create the shot of caffeine we need to get through the morning? 

With analytics, we see a similar pattern. We know we need good data and we get really excited by the tools we use to visualize the results (just look at the Tableau community), but it becomes all too easy to overlook that crucial middle step of processing the data for analysis.

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Above: An example Tableau viz (about coffee, of course) from fellow InterWorker Derrick Austin.

It surprises most people, but the truth is, for quality espresso, you should be investing a large portion of your budget to the grinder. It is the single point in the process that homebrewers control that makes or breaks your espresso. Being able to transform the roasted bean into the perfect form and consistency for brewing, right when you need it, is key to quality espresso. 

See where I'm headed yet? 

The Analytics ‘God Shot’

Most of our clients have quality data lying around and they are ready to spend on the front-end of analytics, all the while neglecting the vital infrastructure to process, transform and enhance their data.  If you want a chance at producing a "God Shot" in analytics, you better make the investment into how you process your raw data.

Data needs to be transformed allow our BI tools to fully leverage them. Data needs to be cleaned, normalizing outliers and standardizing IDs, to create reliable statistics. Data needs to be enhanced by other data sources so that we can make better connects. Data needs to be leveraged by models so that we can have deeper insight. It is when all these things come together in the right way that achieve the sort of analysis that is both transformative and impactful.

There are many tools and platforms out there that aim at doing exactly this, many of which are amazing, and I'd love to help you walk through the process of understanding your needs and finding a tool that fits them. The important thing is that you go and find your "data grinder." Be willing to take part of your BI budget and invest in this key element of the process. You'll see huge dividends in the quality, reliability and speed of your analytics.

The Right Grind with Dataiku

With that said, let me recommend at least one tool that should be on your shortlist: Dataiku. Dataiku bills themselves as a collaborative data science platform, but I've found that sells them short in numerous ways. Beyond its utility, I think it's a delight to use and learn. Its features also go well beyond mere data science.

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Above: Dataiku boasts a ton of fantastic features for a wide audience.

At InterWorks, we describe Dataiku internally as our "data workbench" because of how it provides an entire platform for a team to clean, process, deliver and model data for the many types of outputs we produce, from visualizations to data-driven, intelligent applications. There's even a free version that is the perfect companion for your Tableau Public projects. 

We'll have future blogs that dive specifically into Dataiku features, but if you find yourself looking at tools in this area, check it out. Let us know what you think, too!

Bagging 14ers is all the rage in Colorado, right up there with counting how many days you’ve skied and how long you waited in line for brunch at Snooze. They are badges of honor that many of us wear to establish our belonging in this growing state. But how do you get started in your peak bagging journey if you’re new to it? What peak should you climb first, and how do you decide? Let me help you.

There are a variety of things to consider when deciding what peak to attempt on one of your free weekend days (or week days if you want to beat the crowds), so I built this dashboard to help guide your decision. Let’s get into more detail here and point out some of the specific considerations.

Class

First and foremost, you should think about the difficulty of the peak. Elevation gain and mileage don’t tell you much about the terrain itself, but Class does. Class measures technical difficulty using the Yosemite Decimal System scale. Are you new to climbing mountains? Stick with Class 1 or 2. Do you have lots of climbing experience and are just new to Colorado? Consider Class 3 or 4 if you’re looking for a challenge. Hover over the info icon on the dashboard to see more details:

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Elevation Gain

Altitude impacts us all differently, and regardless of how much total gain there is, we’re all ending up above 14,000’ on one of these peaks. But limiting the total amount of gain - meaning how much elevation you climb from trailhead to summit - may mean less exposure to the inherent risks of hiking and climbing (inclement weather, lightning, altitude sickness, etc.). Less total elevation gain likely means less time on the mountain. On the flip side, maybe you’re looking for a long day with lots of gain. In that case, head up Pikes Peak from Manitou Springs for a resounding 7,000’ in 13 miles one way. Or play around with these options and find something that suits your needs and abilities. 

Total Mileage

Just like elevation gain, think about what you’re looking for and what best helps you manage the risk of being out there. If you’re new, maybe start with something short in mileage with limited elevation gain. Training for the Hardrock 100? Go do some laps on long, steep routes, you beast!

Personal Recommendations

I’ve been up a handful of these myself. Toggle the Show Peaks Brenden Climbed button to see which ones. My favorite is Longs Peak. It’s a classic with lots of terrain variety, and the easiest way up is a comfortable but airy scramble.

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And of course, please follow Leave No Trace guidelines while you’re out there. We all love these spaces for their wild nature and scenic beauty. Let’s help each other continue to enjoy them. Have a nice hike!

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane. Looking back early in your career, if you needed to crunch some numbers, you clicked on Microsoft Excel, figured out how to get your data into the spreadsheet, massaged it some and then hand-built some calculations and charts. It was somewhat clunky, but it worked. 

There was a great sense of accomplishment each time you were able to produce the number you needed, and you began to feel like an expert at Excel who could do the impossible. You sat higher in your chair, you spoke with more authority on conference calls and you didn’t blink if someone wanted a new question answered because you had confidence that you could bend Excel to your will so long as you were given enough time.

Boosting Your Skills with Tableau

Now, fast-forward to the first time you got your hands on Tableau Desktop. It was amazing. You could do the things you were doing in Excel but in a fraction of the time and with much better charts. You realized how clunky building ad hoc and lasting reports in Excel really is. You now feel like a wizard of all things data. A hush falls across the room as you enter because of how revered you are by your peers. You look back on your atrophying Excel skills and chuckle because of how quaint it seems now to have to work that much to do the work that is so effortless today.

Going Further with Portals for Tableau

Fast-forward again to today. You’ve got so many priceless dashboards that are being shared across the organization from your own installation of Portals for Tableau. There’s a huge audience that gets to experience the magic that you’ve created with a little help from Tableau. It’s like living in Nirvana ... except for one little nagging issue: If you need to tweak a setting in your portal, there are so many of your wonderful dashboards to scroll past just to find the ones you need. It can take precious seconds of your very important day. Sure, you could use the search feature to find them one by one by title or description, but that feels clunky. VIPs like you shouldn’t be treated like this.

We agree. 

Introducing Dashboard List Filters

Portals for Tableau now has the ability for advanced filtering. With just a couple of clicks, you immediately get to the list of specific dashboards you need. Once again, you get to feel like a wizard with your mouse as your wand.

You want all the dashboards with a certain keyword to report to you at once? Click, click, done!

You want to see all the dashboards that are featured on the home page? Click, done!

You’re now getting drunk with all of this newfound power. Go ahead. You deserve it.

There are search filters to show dashboards with specific dashboard filters, parameters, tutorials and keywords. There are checkboxes to immediately show the dashboards that are hidden, featured, stories or have tabs.

They are all ready to do your bidding. Command them as you will.

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Magic is what happens when our panel gets together. Magic and gold. This week’s show is a lot of both as Brad, Ben, Kate and Mat talk about Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Tools, self-service analytics as a concept and the different infrastructure options your organization can choose from to meet their needs.

Subscribe to Podcast Your Data through iTunes, Stitcher, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcasting app.

We’re thrilled to announce that InterWorks ranked among the 2018 CRN Tech Elite 250! The award recognizes outstanding IT solution providers across North America based on their technical chops, i.e. the number and level of industry certifications they possess from leading technology vendors. Thanks to InterWorks’ ever-growing partner relationships and competencies, this marks our third consecutive year to receive this honor.

“Success for us is a collaborative effort. We rely on partners to provide the best technology available and then entrust our talented team to get the most out of it for the benefit of our clients. This hustle and dedication forges strong relationships, and those relationships are central to everything we do.”

- Behfar Jahanshahi, CEO, InterWorks

Quality Over Quantity

At first glance, you might think landing on the CRN Tech Elite 250 might be a numbers game. That’s not the case at all. The application process places just as much emphasis on the quality of partnerships and certifications as they do sheer numbers. InterWorks operates much in the same way.

It’s true that we cover a wide array of business needs. To do this, we rely on numerous strategic partnerships to help us provide the best technologies to meet those needs, but we are still incredibly selective with our partners. For us, it’s all about who can provide the most value to our clients at the end of the day. Going further, we only align ourselves with partners who value relationships over transactions. If our strict quality requirements aren’t met, then it’s no dice.

This vetting process is what make partners like Tableau, Snowflake, Dataiku, Alteryx, Dell, VMware, Ruckus Wireless and many more so impressive. They don’t just provide great technology – they’re committed to empowering clients.

The Bottom Line

So, what’s the end result of InterWorks’ selectivity when it comes to technology partners? An improved bottom line for our clients. The care we take in identifying and advocating the best tech solutions available translates into less leg work for our clients and more value for them in the long-run. Rather than being hindered by technology decision, they can focus on their business. This all goes back to relationships.

By keeping our focus on quality relationships, both with clients and partners, we build invaluable trust with everyone involved. We trust our partners to provide quality solutions, and in turn our clients trust us to deliver those solutions with maximum impact. Though trust takes time to build, it’s an essential ingredient to sustained success. It’s worked pretty well for us and our clients over the past 20+, so we think we’ll keep it up.

Curious to see how our strong partnerships and client-first approach can help your business? We'd love to hear from you! Reach out below.

Contact Us

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Is your Tableau Server bogged down with endless extracts? Is your VizQL Server struggling to render your complex visualizations? A slow dashboard is a useless dashboard. Performance is critical.

Researchers from the Forensic Optimization & Obfuscation Lab have pinpointed the secret to smoothing out Tableau Server back-end processes, and it is Kenny G. In particular, Kenny G’s “Greatest Hits” album (1997) was found most effective for enterprise-level deployments, while Tableau Online was better suited for the dulcet tones of “Classics in the Key of G” (1999).

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InterWorks has found great success in expanding operations to include Europe, Asia and now Australia. InterWorks' CEO and Founder was proud to announce the next venture: Wakanda. According to Behfar Jahanshahi (CEO), “Wakanda, a technological leader and innovator, is a natural fit for our values and goals. We are excited to partner with King T’Challa.”

InterWorks, formerly a Tableau Gold Partner, has now reached Vibranium Partner status.

Even though Portals for Tableau are serious about business, that doesn’t mean they don’t have a fun side. You may have noticed that we like what we do at InterWorks and that is reflected in our work. As a result, we’ve added a few fun Easter eggs and cheat codes to make your experience with your portal more entertaining. Here is a subset of them for your enjoyment.

PAC-MAN Loading Screen

Virtually all of our clients take advantage of loading screens for their dashboards to make those precious few seconds while the dashboard is rendering more bearable for your users. Sometimes you’re blending several massive data sets in Tableau and long load times just can’t be avoided. However, we’ve got you covered. Did you know that if your dashboard takes over 30 seconds to load, the loading screen will automatically switch to a game of PAC-MAN?

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Sound Effects

If you’re tired of boring websites, we’ve added a feature to enable sound effects for certain actions in the portal. By enabling this feature, you’ll now get to experience the portal not only with your eyes, but with your ears as well.

To turn on sound effects, type the following sequence while on the backend’s Dashboard page:

↑ (up), ↑ (up), ↓ (down), ↓ (down), ← (left), → (right), ← (left), → (right), B,  A

Here are a few of the sound effects that are included in the feature:

• A toilet flushing sound when flushing your portal’s cache
• The sound of crumpled paper being thrown into a metal trash can when deleting content, such as dashboards, links, pages, etc.
• A door chime when a user logs into the backend
• Fanfare when the portal is upgraded
• … and many more that we’ll let you discover on your own. Be sure to comment below if you’re the first to discover one in your portal.

Language Packs

At this point, you may have figured out that many of us at InterWorks are geeks/nerds. One common stereotype among that demographic is speaking in fun languages, like Klingon, Elvish, etc. How could we not add that ability to Portals for Tableau?

To enable a language pack, type one of the following words while on the backend’s Settings page:

• Klingon (Star Trek) - yIDoghQo’
• Elvish (Lord of the Rings) - Pedig edhellen?
• Dothraki (Game of Thrones) - Ase shafki athdrivar
• Ewokese (Star Wars) – Allayloo
• Minionese (Despicable Me) - Pwede na?
• Pig Latin - Ilapray Oolsfay

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Enjoy these new features!  … Oh, and have a merry April Fool’s Day! Who knows, one day we may add these Easter eggs for real.

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With aims to broaden their global customer base, Tableau Software (NYSE: DATA) announced today a Dothraki language version. The excitement in the Grass Sea resounding among the Horde user groups was palpable as many lambs were put to slaughter and libations were made to the Stallion that Mounts the World. In honor of the momentous occasion, Tableau executives toasted with goblets of horse blood.

Tableau confirmed the name for the tool locally will be Mai Nesikh, translated as the Mother of All Data.

Can you believe that we're already a full quarter into 2018? March brought with it some fantastic content. In addition to our usual Tableau and data visualization fare, we have a handful of blog posts covering Snowflake and Dataiku– two fantastic new technology partners that have created some pretty mind-blowing solutions in their respective areas. Of course, to cap off all the knowledge and new developments, we have a fun little piece chronicling the WinterWorks Office Olympics. It's guaranteed to provide some laughs. 

We hope your March was as productive and fun as our was! As always, thanks for reading.

News & Events

• InterWorks Blog Roundup – February 2018
• Event Debrief - February 2018
• InterWorks Named to the 2018 CRN Tech Elite 250
• Building InterWorks Australia: Start with Rambo, then Form Voltron

Tableau Data Vizzes

• Which 14er Should I Climb?
• Open Data Viz: San Francisco 311 Calls
• Visualizing 7 Years of Movement on the Gartner BI Magic Quadrant
• Predicting March Madness in Tableau: 2018 Edition

Tableau Tips and Tricks

• 3 Reasons to Attend to Your Local Tableau User Group
• Tableau for Finance: Why Use a BI Tool in a Finance Team?
• Tableau Quick Tip: Top N and Bottom N Filters
• Tableau Extended: Pivoting Fields on the Data Connection Page

Portals for Tableau

• Portals for Tableau New Feature Spotlight: Dashboard List Filters
• Portals for Tableau New Feature Spotlight: REST API Version Checker
• Portals for Tableau New Feature Spotlight: SAML Metadata Import

Podcast Your Data!

• PYD53 - Tableau Performance
• PYD54 - Gartner & Self-Service Analytics

Snowflake

• Introducing Snowflake: Cloud-Based Data Warehousing
• InterWorks Becomes a Snowflake Solution Partner

Dataiku

• InterWorks Partners with Dataiku to Democratize Data Science and Data Preparation
• Data & Espresso: The Pursuit of the ‘God Shot’

Culture

• Fun, Family and the 2018 WinterWorks Office Olympics

OuterWorks

(Other interesting blogs we are reading outside of IW)

• Female voices—past and present—emerge as powerful leaders in data - Petra Clementson, Tableau
• Spring is springing earlier and earlier - Lauren Tierney, The Washington Post
• 2018 MLB Predictions - FiveThirtyEight
• Using a Filter Action as a Parameter - Drawing with Numbers, Jonathan Drummey

Everyone who knows me, knows I love pinball. To me, pinball is a wonderful mixture of art, physics, design and history that's intertwined into a gameplay that's both analog and digital. It's not just me, the U.S. has had a long love affair with pinball, starting with its roots as a cheap Depression-era form of entertainment to an expression of youth rebellion in 1970s arcades to its recent revival as a nostalgic barcade activity.  

Also, if you think pinball doesn’t have an interesting history, check out this picture of the NYC Police Commissioner in 1949 taking a sledgehammer to a pinball machine and tell me that’s not interesting! Given my love of pinball as well as having that curious, data-nerdy trait that seems so abundant here at InterWorks, it was only a matter of time before I made a pinball data visualization.

The Data Viz

This viz is meant to let you explore the current state of pinball in the U.S. through all the known pinball machines in public places. What are the best pinball cities? What are the most popular pinball machines? From a Tableau perspective, nothing crazy fancy going on here except for maybe two features:

1. The Heat Map: Yes, proper geographic heat maps (or density maps) will eventually be native in Tableau as announced at #TC17 (possibly in 2018?).
2. Viz in Tooltip: Ah, the long-awaited Viz in Tooltip. In my case, I wanted the user to see the most popular pinball machines were still around plotted by the manufacture year, without excessively bogging down the viz. Here's how to get started making a viz in the tooltip.

The Data

PinballMap.com is the perfect resource for navigating the pinball world. I want to play The Addam’s Family? I consult PinballMap to tell me where to find one. If I’m traveling to a new city and want to pin? I consult PinballMap to help me find the best arcade in town. They collect user-driven data on pinball machines, locations and quality. Lucky for me, they also provide a handy API for accessing their wealth of data. 

The Prep

There a few things I needed to do here:

1. Get the data.
2. Union a bunch of JSON files together and transform to a usable form .
3. Combine with Census data.
4. Get the data into Tableau.

I used a combination of Python and Alteryx for the data prep – Python to get the data and Alteryx for the rest.

Getting Data with Python

The data is divided into 93 separate regions, which can be individually downloaded. I could take the time to download each region manually, but that’s way too much work. So, I wrote a quick python script to find all the regions and programmatically download all regions. Here’s what that looks like:

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Alteryx Data Prep

By all means, the data could be prepped in Python. Though, for a few reasons, I turned to my favorite data Swiss army knife, Alteryx. Here's why:

1. The JSON format played well the Alteryx's JSON parser. 
2. I needed to spatial join (or spatial match) pinball locations to Census geometry and population values. Alteryx makes this easy.
3. I like Alteryx.

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The Basic Workflow

• Point to the directory with the 93 JSON files and union together with Alteryx’s Wildcard feature inside the Input tool.
• Cross tabulate the data to get a unique record for each pinball machine.
• Spatial match (or spatial join in the GIS world) the pinball locations to Census CBSA’s to bring in population data and provide a geographic unit of analysis.
• Clip the points to the boundary of the U.S. (sorry, Canada).

The Population Data

In the viz, I calculate pinball machines per capita, which requires the inclusion of Census population data. I also use Metropolitan Statistical Areas for my unit of analysis. For you Alteryx users out there, you don’t need the spatial data package to access 2010 Census data with their Allocate tools. Just get it here for free. This download is real handy if you need quick access to 2010 Census tables and geometry but don’t want to mess around with Census American Factfinder.

The Heat Map

Heat maps are fun and a good way to visualize relative geographic distribution of a phenomena. Though, the data prep can be a little cumbersome, even in traditional GIS tools. Alteryx is an excellent spatial data tool, and it’s possible to set up the heat map data in Alteryx to display in Tableau. Chris Love put together a really useful macro to do nearly all the work here. I simply put the x,y coordinates of all the pinball locations with a count of pinball machines in each establishment as the "heat" value. I tweaked the distance decay parameters a bit to get a heat map that made sense for the distribution of my points and the area of interest (i.e., the entire U.S.).

Next

Are you a data-nerd and like pinball? Stay tuned. There’s plenty of data in this dataset to splice and dice. You’ll be seeing more on the subject from me soon.