In honor of National Doughnut Day (June 1st), let’s devour this sweet Tableau tip without worrying about the calories. In this video I we will create a multiple donut chart visualization that will display the sum of profits by a region. Then we’ll use the donuts as a filter for a simple dashboard. Once you finish watching this video you’ll know how to create and use donut charts as a filter to other information on your dashboard.

I know that donuts are not considered best practice, (especially when negative numbers are involved) but they have their uses. Assuming you know that bar charts are a best practice, it never hurts to learn other techniques that add a little “flair” from the boring world of bar charts.

Have you ever looked at a Picasso painting? Obviously Picasso was well versed in painting best practices (understatement) but in some of his art, the people are not rendered in the best practice. Always learn the best practices, but know when to leave them behind and add a little flair! (In no way am I comparing myself to Picasso).

Three Musicians by Picasso is not best practice but it is a work of art!

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In this video I will explain the concept of jittering and how to use it to scatter your data points in Tableau. In a normal box plot Tableau data points are stacked on top of each other which makes it more difficult to understand positioning. By using this simple tip combining a calculated field a parameter, you will be on your way to gaining a better understanding of your data points. We’re going to get our “Moneyball” on by analyzing average NBA player points per game in the 2016 season.

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There are may different ways to create a hex map in Tableau. The hex map helps visualize state geographic data at the same size which helps to overcome discrepancies that make smaller states harder to interpret. Also, larger states (e.g. Alaska) can overwhelm a traditional map with their size.

I’ve found that the quickest and easiest way to build a hex map is to leverage a pre-built shape file. Shape files can be found at various open data sources like census.gov or data.gov.

In this video I will use a shape file created by Tableau Zen Master Joshua Milligan who runs the blog vizpainter.com. He has a blog post where you can download the shape file I reference. Hats off to Joshua for creating and sharing this great shape file!

There are a couple of tweaks that can be made to the Quadrant Analysis video I showed you earlier. We can enhance upon the first iteration of the analysis by making the visualization interactive. I will create parameter driven quadrants where the reference lines are not static at a 50% intersection.

You can tweak the instructions to suit your actual visualization as necessary, but the concepts will remain the same.

We’re going to create two new parameters and have those parameters dynamically control the placement of our reference lines. Then we’re going to update the calculated field which defines the color of each data point or mark, with the parameters we created. In this manner, the colors of each mark will dynamically update as the references lines are adjusted.

To put this in English, as you change the parameter values, the reference lines will move and the mark colors will update.

Watch the video above and/or follow along with the instructions below.

Remove Existing Reference Lines:

Step 1:

• Remove all existing reference lines from the original quadrant analysis. Simply right click on a reference line and select “Remove”.
• Also remove the annotations from the 4 quadrants.

Create Parameters

Step 2:

• Create a parameter named “Percentile FG Pct” (without quotes). Select the dropdown triangle next to “Find Field” icon and choose “Create Parameter”.

Make sure your parameter is setup as a “Float” and the Range of values reflects the picture below. The Display Format will be set as “Percentage” with zero decimal places.

Step 3: Duplicate Your Parameter

• Right click on your new parameter and select “Duplicate”.
• Right click on “Percentile Wins” and select “Edit”.
• Name the new parameter “Percentile Wins”.

Step 4: Show the Parameters Controls

• Right click on each parameter and select “Show Parameter Control”.
• Right click on each drop down triangle in the upper right corner of the Parameter Control and select “Slider”.

Step 5: Add Reference Lines

• Right click on the Percentile of FG% Axis at the bottom of the viz. Select “Add Reference Line”. The Line Value should refer to the X axis parameter (i.e. Percentile FG Pct). For the Line Formatting I choose the third dashed lined option.

• Right click on the Percentile of Wins Axis on the left side of the viz. Select “Add Reference Line”. The Line Value should refer to the Y axis parameter (i.e. Percentile of Wins).

At this point you should have two parameter controls that adjust the placement of the respective reference lines on the visualization.

However, you’ll notice that the colors of the marks do not change as the reference lines move in increments.

Step 6: Edit the original calculated field to use parameters instead of hardcoded percentage values

Right click on the calculated field (i.e. “Color Calc” in my case), select “Edit” and change all references of “.5” to the corresponding parameter name.

• The original calculated field:

IF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) >= .5 AND RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) >= .5 THEN ‘TOP RIGHT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) < .5 and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) >= .5 THEN ‘TOP LEFT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) < .5 and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) < .5 THEN ‘BOTTOM LEFT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) >= .5 and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) < .5 THEN ‘BOTTOM RIGHT’

ELSE ‘OTHER’

END

Is edited to become:

IF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) >= [Percentile FG Pct] AND RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) >= [Percentile Wins] THEN ‘TOP RIGHT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) < [Percentile FG Pct] and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) >= [Percentile Wins] THEN ‘TOP LEFT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) < [Percentile FG Pct] and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) < [Percentile Wins] THEN ‘BOTTOM LEFT’

ELSEIF RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([FG%])) >= [Percentile FG Pct] and RANK_PERCENTILE(SUM([Wins])) < [Percentile Wins] THEN ‘BOTTOM RIGHT’

ELSE ‘OTHER’

END

In the above formula both [Percentile FG Pct] and [Percentile Wins] are parameter values that have replaced the hardcoded values of “.5”.

Final Result:

As you change your parameter values on the parameter control, the corresponding reference line moves and the color of each mark changes automatically to fit its new quadrant.

Notice how the marks are colored according to their respective quadrant in the screen print below.

I hope you enjoyed this tip. Now, get out there and do some good things with your data!

Anthony Smoak

Release your inner Gartner and learn how to create a 2×2 matrix in Tableau. In this video I will perform a quadrant analysis in Tableau using NBA data to plot FG% vs Wins. Since the data points will be compact, we’ll use percentiles to expand the data and create a calculated field to color the data points per respective quadrant.

Make sure to check out part 2 of this series where I will show you how to make the quadrant boundaries interactive.

If you’re interested in Business Intelligence & Tableau subscribe and check out my videos either here on this site or on my Youtube channel.