Tag: Parameter Actions

Can you filter or drill to details?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

Sean set this week’s challenge to give an alternative solution to displaying a table of details rather than the traditional ‘pancake table’ (his words not mine 🙂 ).

The main crux of the challenge relates to the dashboard actions and interactivity, so I’ll be brief(ish) in describing how to build the charts.

Creating the line chart

Add Order Date to Columns at the month-year continuous (green pill) level. Add Sales to Rows. Format Sales to $ with 0 dp. Remove the title on the Order Date axis. Update the Tooltip to give an instruction to ‘click the line to filter’. Rename the sheet Sales Trend or similar.

Creating the bar chart

Add Sub-Category to Rows and Sales to Columns. Sort by Sales descending. Hide the Sub-Category row heading label (right click > hide field labels for rows). Update the Tooltip to give an instruction to ‘click the bar to filter’. Rename the sheet Sales by Sub Bar or similar.

Creating the Tree Map

Add Segment and Ship Mode to Detail and Sales to Size. Move Segment to Colour and reduce opacity to about 60%. Move Ship Mode to Label and then add additional Segment and Sales pills to Label. Add a table calculation against the Sales pill on the Label shelf, so it is applying a percentage of Total by Segment only.

Add another instance of the Sales pill to Label and then update the layout of the label.

Move the Segment pills on the marks shelf so they are positioned below the Ship Mode to ensure the tree map is segmented based on the Ship Mode (there should be four blocks divided by the thicker white lines).

Update the Tooltip to give an instruction to ‘click the treemap to filter’. Rename the sheet Treemap or similar.

Build the Details table

On a new sheet add Order ID, Customer Name, Order Date (as a discrete exact date – blue pill), Ship Date (as a discrete exact date – blue pill) and Product Name to Rows. Add Sales to Text. Format Profit to $ with 0 dp and drag onto the canvas over the columns of Sales numbers, and release the mouse when the Show Me option appears. Add Discount into the Measure Values section. Change the aggregation to Average and then format to be % to 0 dp. Rearrange the order of the pills in the Measure Values section as required. Add Segment, Sub-Category and Ship Mode to the Detail shelf. Update the title to reference these 3 pills. Hide the Tooltip. Rename the sheet Details or similar.

Building the additional calculations needed

In clicking around Sean’s solution, I was finding what I had initially built wasn’t quite doing what Sean did. If I clicked on the bar chart and then the tree map, the details were only filtered based on the tree map and vice versa. There were ways to solve this, but this then resulted in other issues, in that after closing the details table, the charts remained filtered, but it wasn’t obvious as nothing was highlighted. Basically what I’m trying to say, is the filtering seemed like it should be straightfoward, but wasn’t. I ended up using a combination of parameters and filter actions.

So we’ll start by dealing with the parameters we need.

Create the following parameters

pSelectedDate

date parameter defaulted to 01 Jan 1900

pSelectedSegment

string parameter defaulted to <emptystring>

pSelectedShipMode

string parameter defaulted to <emptystring>

pSelectedSubCat

string parameter defaulted to <emptystring>

Then create the following calculated fields

Filter: Date

[pSelectedDate] = #1900-01-01# OR [pSelectedDate]=DATETRUNC(‘month’,[Order Date])

add this to the Filter shelf on the bar chart, tree map and details sheets and set to True.

Filter: SubCat

[pSelectedSubCat]=” OR [pSelectedSubCat]=[Sub-Category]

add this to the filter shelf on the line chart, tree map and details sheets and set to True

Filter: Segment

[pSelectedSegment]=” OR [pSelectedSegment]=[Segment]

add this to the filter shelf on the line chart, bar chart and details sheets and set to True

Filter: Ship Mode

add this to the filter shelf on the line chart, bar chart and details sheets and set to True

We also need a parameter to capture when we want to show the details table.

pClickMade

boolean parameter defaulted to False.

and to supplement it, we need a calculated field to use to set this parameter to true

Click Made

TRUE

Add Click Made to the Detail shelf of the line chart, bar chart and tree map.

We’ll set these parameters later.

Building the Close icon

The ‘close’ cross when the details sheet is displayed is another sheet. On clicking on it, we will want to set the pClickMade parameter to False so the Details will no longer show. For this we will need

Close

FALSE

Add this field to the Detail shelf on a new sheet. Change the mark type to shape and change the shape to a X. Set the colour to black and set to fit entire view. Hide the Tooltip. Name the sheet Close or similar.

Building the dashboard and interactivity

Using layout containers, arrange the line chart, bar chart and tree map into a dashboard. Use padding and background colours to get the layout as desired.

The add the Details sheet as a floating object and position over the top of the other charts. Set the background to white and add a black border. Also float the Close sheet into position too. Hide the title and also add a black border.

Select the Close sheet object, and then from the Layout tab in the left hand nav, check the Control visibility using value checkbox and select the pClickMade parameter

It should disappear if the parameter is still set to false. Repeat the same process with the Detail sheet object.

Now create the following dashboard parameter actions

Filter Month

On select of the Sales Trend sheet, target the pSelectedDate parameter, passing in the value from the Order Date. When the selection is cleared, reset to 01 Jan 1900.

Filter SubCat

On select of the Sales by Sub Bar sheet, target the pSelectedSubCat parameter, passing in the value from the Sub-Category. When the selection is cleared, reset to <emptystring>.

Filter Ship Mode

On select of the Treemap sheet, target the pSelectedShipMode parameter, passing in the value from the Ship Mode. When the selection is cleared, reset to <emptystring>.

Filter Segment

On select of the Treemap sheet, target the pSelectedSegment parameter, passing in the value from the Segment. When the selection is cleared, reset to <emptystring>.

Drill to Details

Via the menu of the Sales by Sub Bar, Sales Trend, and Treemap sheets, target the pClickMade parameter passing in the value from the Click Made field. When the selection is cleared, set the value to False.

Close Details

On select of the Close sheet, target the pClickMade parameter, passing in the value from the Close field. When the selection is cleared, keep the value.

If you start clicking around, you should find that all these actions do provide some level of filtering, but if you for example, click on the bar (to filter the line and treemap), and then click on a section in the tree map and use the ‘Drill down to details’ menu option, the details table has lost the filtering of the bar chart as the bar has become unselected when the treemap chart was clicked.

To resolve this, apply filter actions to the line chart, bar chart and tree map objects (the quickest way to do this is just select the object on the dashboard and click the ‘filter’ icon in the context menu.

If you do this on all 3 sheets and then look at the list of dashboard actions you’ll see 3 ‘Filter x (generated)’ entries.

By applying this mix of filtering through ‘default’ dashboard filter actions in conjunction with parameters, I think you have a more complete and understandable experience. And you will have to explicitly unselect each of the marks you clicked on to remove that filter. I added instructions on the dashboard to aid with this.

My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Can you use containers and dynamic zone visibility?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

This week’s #WOW2025 challenge was set live as part of TC25. Unfortunately, this year I couldn’t be there in person to meet everyone, which for the last 3 years has been my conference highlight 😦

Anyway, Kyle set the challenge, and conscious of time, provided a starting workbook, so the focus could be on the container and DZV functionality. For those who nailed this, he added some additional interactivity with dashboard actions.

So the first thing is to download the starter workbook from the challenge page.

I’m going to attempt to build this in the order of Kyle’s requirements.

Layout out the dashboard

So the requirement states that no floating objects are allowed. Typically when I build a dashboard for business purposes or where the layout is a little complicated, I always start by adding a floating container sized to the exact dashboard size and positioned 0,0. I then add tiled objects into it. Doing this means I don’t end up with Tiled container objects on my dashboard (or if any get added when legends/filters get automatically added, I just move any items I want to retain and then delete the Tiled container).

However, as Kyle says ‘no floating’, I will build adding to the ‘default’ dashboard which means there will be containers on there I don’t really want.

Now blogging about containers is usually very tricky as it’s hard to explain where things need to go. So I’ll be supplementing this with a lot of screen shots – fingers crossed following along works out ok!

To start, create a dashboard sheet and resize to 1200 x 900 as required. Observe the item hierarchy section of the Layout pane as this is where you’ll see all the containers and objects as we add them to the dashboard.

The main structure of the display is split into 2 columns, so start by adding a horizontal layout container to the dashboard. Once added, add 2 blank objects side by side to give the basic layout. Adding blank objects helps when positioning the required objects and is recommended when dealing with layout containers, especially if you’re new to them. They will ultimately be deleted as we go. Rename the horizontal container H – 2 cols or similar (right click on the container in the item hierarchy  > rename).

Notice how a Tiled container has now also appeared on the dashboard, even though we only added a horizontal container.

The first column of the dashboard contains 2 charts – the Scatterplot and the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison sheets – stacked on top of each other. For this, add a vertical layout container between the two blank objects. Rename this V – Col 1.

Add the Scatterplot sheet into the vertical container and then add Sales & Profit Comparison underneath it.

The various legends associated with these 2 sheets, automatically get added into their own vertical container on the right hand side. These aren’t required, so from the item hierarchy, select the Vertical container and then Remove from dashboard.

The right hand column of the display will show the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month sheet and another (hidden) chart that needs to be built.

Add another vertical container between the V – Col 1 container and the right hand blank object. Name this V – Col 2, and add the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month sheet and then another blank object underneath it. Once again remove the right hand vertical container that is automatically added with all the legends/filters.

Now we have the ‘core’ layout, the 2 blank objects we added to the horizontal container, H – 2 Cols, right at the start, can be removed, so hopefully you should have a layout organised as below.

Now add the dashboard title (Dashboard menu > Show Title, and then update the text). This will automatically add a vertical layout container around all the existing contents.

Building the Sales & Profit Ratio by Sub-Category bar chart

On a new sheet, add Sub-Category to Rows and Sales to Columns. Add Profit Ratio to Colour and adjust the colour legend to use the Red-Black Diverging colour palette. Hide the Sub-Category row label heading (right click > hide field labels for rows).

The bar chart needs to be filtered when a State in the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison chart is clicked on, or when a Date is selected in the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month chart. However, I noticed when clicking around, that when clicking the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month chart, it filtered the above bar chart by both the State and Date. So based on this, create 3 parameters.

S&PR Comp State

String parameter defaulted to empty string

S&PR by Month State

String parameter defaulted to empty string

S&PR by Month Date

Date parameter defaulted to 01 Jan 1900 (essentially a null date)

Show these parameters on the sheet.

We want to filter the chart if the S&PR Comp State has a value and the S&PR by Month Date is the ‘null’ date (which means we’ve interacted with the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison chart), or if the S&PR Monthly State has a value AND the S&PR by Month Date has a value (which means we’ve interacted with the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month chart). So create

Filter – S&PR by SubCat

([State Name] = [S&PR Comp State] AND ([S&PR by Month Date]=#1900-01-01#))

OR

(([State Name] = [S&PR by Month State]) AND (DATETRUNC(‘month’, [Order Date]) = DATETRUNC(‘month’, [S&PR by Month Date])))

Enter a State name into the S&PR Comp State parameter (eg New Jersey), then add the Filter – S&PR by SubCat field to the Filter shelf and set to True. The chart should change.

Verify the functionality by adding a state and date into the other parameters eg 01 March 2021 and Texas

Empty the state parameters and set the date back to 01 Jan 1900. Name the sheet Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat. The chart contents will disappear.

Creating a dynamic title sheet

Originally I hoped to do this without using another sheet and just using the title of the bar chart, but I need the date to show nothing rather than Jan 1900 depending on the user interactivity, so a new sheet is required.

But for it, we need some additional calculated fields.

State for Title

IIF([S&PR by Month State]<>”,[S&PR by Month State], [S&PR Comp State])

We only want to show the name of the state once, and both parameters may have it set.

Date for Title

IF [S&PR by Month Date]=#1900-01-01# THEN ” ELSE DATENAME(‘month’,[S&PR by Month Date]) + ‘ ‘ + STR(YEAR([S&PR by Month Date])) END

Line

IF [S&PR by Month Date]<>#1900-01-01# THEN ‘|’ ELSE ” END

Add all 3 fields to the Detail shelf of a new sheet. Change the mark type to polygon. Update the sheet title as below

Name the sheet S&PR Title Sheet or similar

Adding the bar chart, title & legend to the dashboard

All 3 of these objects – the bar chart, the title sheet and the profit ratio legend need to show or hide based on interactivity. To do this in one step, we can encapsulate the 3 objects within containers within another ‘parent’ container and control the visibility on the ‘parent’ container.

Add a vertical container between the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month chart and the blank object. Name this V – S&PR SubCat Chart

Add the Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat sheet into this. Then add another horizontal container and place it above the Sales & Profit Ratio by Sub Cat chart (making sure it’s within the V – S&PR Sub Cat Chart container. Rename this H – S&PR Sub Cat Title.

Add the S&PR by Title sheet into this horizontal container, and then click on the Profit Ratio legend on the right hand side and move this object to sit to the right of the title sheet. Then click on the right hand column containing all the remaining legends, and delete this container from the dashboard. Then remove the blank object that’s sitting beneath the Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat sheet. You should have something like below…

Adjust the width of the S&PR Title sheet so its wider. Set the sheet to Fit Entire View. Then select the H – S&PR SubCat Title container and edit the height to be 90 px.

Hide the title of the Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat sheet.

Hiding and showing the Sales & Proft Ratio by Sub Category section

Create a new calculated field

Show S&PR by Sub Cat

[S&PR by Month State]<>” OR [S&PR Comp State]<>”

On the dashboard, select the V – S&PR SubCat Chart container and on the Layout pane, check the Control visibility using value checkbox, and select the Show S&PR by Sub Cat field. Assuming all the parameters are set to their default values, then the whole section should disappear, although the container will still be selected.

To make the section show, we need to set the parameters using dashboard parameter actions.

Set S&PR Comp State

On select of the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison sheet, set the S&PR Comp State parameter passing in the value of the State Name field. When the selection is cleared, set the value back to <emptysrting>

Click on a row in the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison bar chart, and the Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat chart should display, filtered to that State, with the selected state name in the title.

Click the state again, and the chart disappears.

Create 2 further dashboard parameter actions

Set S&PR by Month State

On select of the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month sheet, set the S&PR by Month State parameter, passing in the value from the State Name field. When the selection is cleared, set it back to <emptystring>

Set S&PR by Month Date

On select of the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month sheet, set the S&PR by Month Date parameter, passing in the value from the Month([Order Date]) field. When the selection is cleared, set it back to 01/01/1900

Now click on a point in the line chart, and the Sales & Profit Ratio by SubCat chart should display filtered to the relevant state and month

Adding the Additional Interactivity

When the Scatterplot is clicked, the State in the existing Scatterplot State parameter should be updated. Create a dashboard parameter action

Set Scatterplot State

On select of the Scatterplot sheet, set the Scatterplot State parameter, passing in the value from the State field. When the selection is cleared, retain the value

If you click around the scatterplot, the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month line chart and Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison charts should update.

But we don’t want the other marks on the scatter plot to ‘fade’. To solve this, create a dashboard filter action.

Deselect Scatter marks

On select of the Scatterplot sheet on the dashboard, target the Scatterplot sheet directly, setting the fields TRUE = FALSE. On clearing the selection, show all values.

Finally, the last requirement is to highlight the line in the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month chart associated to the State selected in the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison chart. For this first create a dashboard set action to capture the selected state

Add State to Set

On select of the Sales & Profit Ratio Comparison sheet, target the State Name Set. Check the single-select only checkbox. Running the action should Assign value to set and clearing the selection should remove all values from set

Then add a dashboard highlight action

Highlight Monthly Trend Chart

On select of the Sales & Profit Ration Comparison sheet, target the Sales & Profit Ratio by Month sheet targeting the State Name field only

And hopefully, with all this, you should have a fully interactive dashboard. My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin!

Donna

Binary Parameters

Donna ColesLeave a comment

This week’s challenge was a guest post by Felicia Styer, who wanted us to make multiple selections using just a single parameter, rather than any groupings or sets.

We’ll start by focusing on the initial requirement, which was to bucket into Sub-Categories selected and those not.

Setting up the parameter

The main functionality is controlled via a single string parameter which will just contain a string of 0s and 1s. 0 indicates the Sub-Category is not selected, 1 indicates it is. The position of the 1 or 0 in the string represents the associated Sub-Category. There are 17 Sub-Categories in the data set, so we need to create a parameter of 17 characters. Arbitrarily set some entries to 1 and the rest to 0.

Binary Parameter

string parameter containing the string 01000101000010000

Building the Sales by Subcategory viz

Add Sub-Category to Rows and Sales to Columns. Sort by Sales descending.

We want to assign a number for each row. We can use Index() or Rank the rows based on Sales. I chose to to the latter

Sub Cat Rank

RANK_UNIQUE(SUM(Sales), ‘desc’)

Format this to a number with 0dp but prefixed with #

Add this to Rows, change to discrete (blue pill) and then move to be listed before Sub-Category.

We want to colour the bars based on the ‘bucket’ they’re in according to the Binary Parameter.

Bucket

MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank],1)

This returns the character that is in the nth position in the string – ie Tables is ranked fourth, so this calculation will return the 4th character in the Binary Parameter string.

Add this to Colour and adjust accordingly. Show the Binary Parameter on the sheet, and then adjust the values between 1 and 0 to see the bars change colour.

When a bar is clicked, we want to update the parameter. We will use a dashboard parameter action to drive this functionality, but we need to pass a value into the parameter. This value needs to be a 17 character string of 1s or 0s, where only the character at the nth position based on the rank needs to differ.

For example, the string 01000101000010000 indicates Phones is selected – it’s ranked 2nd in the list and the 2nd character of the string is a 1. When Phones is clicked, we want it to become unselected. So the character in the 2nd position needs to change to a 0, while all the other characters remain the same.

Value for Param

IF [Bucket] = “0” THEN
LEFT([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]-1) + “1” + MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]+1)
ELSE
LEFT([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]-1) + “0” + MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]+1)
END

If the row is currently in Bucket 0, then get the portion of the Binary Parameter string before the nth term, concatenate it to 1 and then concatenate that with the portion of the Binary Parameter string after the nth term, otherwise, the row is associated to Bucket 1, so concatenate the preceding and following string with a 0 instead.

Add this to the Detail shelf.

Finalise the display by adding Sales to the Label, removing row & column dividers, updating the Tooltip, hiding the column headers and adjusting the font size.

Adding the selection interactivity

Add the sheet to a dashboard. Add a dashboard parameter action

Set Bucket

On selection of the sheet, set the Binary Parameter parameter passing the value of the Value for Param field. Leave the parameter with the current value when selection is cleared.

Click a bar to test the functionality. The bars should be changing colour. However, on click, Tableau automatically highlights the selected bar and the others ‘fade’. We’re already using colour to identify what’s been selected, so don’t want this to happen. To resolve this we will apply the True/False method to deselect the marks which is documented here.

You will need to create True and False calculated fields, and add them to the Detail shelf of the viz sheet. Then add a dashboard filter action as below.

Now when you click, the bars immediately change to the right colour with a single click of the mouse.

Building the Sales by Bucket bar chart

On a new sheet, add Sales to Columns, Bucket to Rows and Sub-Category to Detail. Adjust the table calculation setting of the Bucket pill so it is computing explicitly by Sub-Category.

Add Bucket to Colour and again adjust the table calculation as above. When you hover over the bar, you will see it is actually a stacked bar of each Sub-Category. We want these ordered so those with the smallest sales are on the left. Apply a Sort to the Sub-Category field on the Detail shelf to sort by Sales Descending

Widen each row. Add Sales to Label and set the Label to only show when selected (so they only appear when the segment of the bar is clicked on)

Add a Reference line to the Sales axis that shows the Sum of Sales per cell, and displays the Value. Don’t show any line or tooltip, and ensure the reference line isn’t recalculated when the bar chart is clicked.

Format the reference line label so it is positioned right middle, and adjust the font size.

Once again remove any row/column dividers and row headings and adjust the font sizes.

Arrange this chart onto the dashboard with the other chart using layout containers as required.

My version of this challenge is published here.

Bonus Challenge

For the bonus challenge to use more than 2 buckets, there was no example actually published. So I interpreted it as each click added it to the next bucket until you reached the maximum number of buckets allowed, at which point the Sub-Category would become deselected.

For this I created a parameter

# of Buckets

integer parameter from 1 to 5

The expectation in this instance was that rather than a string of 1s and 0s in the parameter, the parameter could contain any number from 0 up to # of Buckets – 1.

So the Value for Parameter field just had to change to become

IF [Bucket] = “0” THEN
//we’ve clicked once so move it to 1st bucket
LEFT([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]-1) + “1” + MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]+1)
ELSEIF [Bucket] = STR([# of Buckets]) THEN
//we’re already at the end, so reset to the starting position of 0
LEFT([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]-1) + “0” + MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]+1)
ELSE
// need to move to the next bucket
LEFT([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]-1) + STR(INT([Bucket])+1) + MID([Binary Parameter],[Sub Cat Rank]+1)
END

The Colours associated to the Bucket field also then need to be updated to handle however many buckets you have, which you can set initially by manually updating the Binary Parameter parameter.

Note – as I have both versions in my workbook, I have fields suffixed with ‘bonus’ to represent the calculated fields/parameters needed.

My published version of this viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Can you compare to a selected months value?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

This week’s challenge by Lorna was to deliver some functionality without using LODs or table calculations. She hinted that parameters and parameter actions would be your friends.

Setting up the parameters

Create a parameter to capture the month selected

pMonth

date parameter defaulted to 01 April 2023

and then create one that will store the value associated to the month selected

pMonthSales

float parameter defaulted to 0

Building the Viz

On a new sheet add Order Date as a continuous (green) pill at the month-year level to Columns. Add Sales to Rows.

Create a new calculated field

Difference from Selected Sales

SUM([Sales]) – [pMonthSales]

and add this to Rows.

Change the mark type of this second marks card to bar and add Difference From Selected Sales to the Colour shelf. Adjust the colour to a diverging scale and centre at 0

Set the Size of the bars to be Manual rather than Fixed and adjust the slider to suit.

Add a reference line to the Order Date axis, that references the pMonth parameter.

Adjust the Tooltips, remove gridlines and add a title.

Adding the interactivity

Add the sheet to a dashboard. Add a dashboard parameter action

Set Date

On select of the viz, update the pMonth parameter with the value from the Month([Order Date]) field.

Add another dashboard action

Set Value

On select of the Viz, update the pMonthSales parameter with the value from the SUM(Sales) field that is aggregated at the SUM level.

Now if you click on a point on the line chart, the bottom bars should alter, but they’ll all appear ‘faded’ initially.

To resolve this, create a new calculated field

HL

“HL”

and add this to the Detail shelf of the All marks card. Then create a dashboard highlight action

Highlight

On select of the viz, highlight the HL field only

When you now click, the bottom marks aren’t faded as they essentially are all ‘highlighted’ too.

And that’s it for this week!

My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Filter for One Value OR All Others

Donna ColesLeave a comment

Erica set the latest challenge, testing us on our ability to master tricky filter scenarios – in this case either show the info for one specific value of a field, or only show the other values, but allow them to be filtered themselves too. The challenge had two parts – the main challenge and a bonus option. I managed to complete both, so will blog both too.

Main challenge – Building the basic viz

On a new sheet add Region and Category to Rows and Sales to Columns. Add Region to Colour and adjust accordingly.

Sort Region by Sales descending

and then click the descended sort button on the toolbar to sort the Category field by Sales too.

Format Sales to be $ with 0 dp. Remove column dividers, and widen each row slightly.

Main challenge – Apply the filtering

Create a parameter

pRegionType

string parameter with 2 options : Not West and West, defaulted to Not West

Create a calculated field to determine whether to display the West Region only, or the other Regions

Filter Region West or Not v1

([pRegionType] = ‘West’ AND [Region] = ‘West’)
OR
([pRegionType] = ‘Not West’ AND [Region] <> ‘West’)

Add this to the Filter shelf and set to True. This is essentially the ‘first level’ filter. Show the parameter and switch between the two values to see the behaviour

Now we need a ‘second’ filter, to allow the relevant Regions to be selected. For this, add Region to the Filter shelf, but select the Use all option

and then show the Region filter list on the canvas, and adjust the settings so only relevant values are displayed

This means when the pRegionType parameter is West, only West will be displayed in the Region filter, but when Not West is selected, all regions except West will display, and the filter can be interacted with in the normal manner.

Main challenge – Building the dashboard

Arrange the viz and the parameters on the dashboard as required, using layout containers, padding and background colours to help organise the content and display required.

We only want the Region selection filter to display when the pRegionType parameter is set to Not West. We can use dynamic zone visibility for this. Create a calculated field

DMZ – Display Filter Control

[pRegionType] = ‘Not West’

and then on the dashboard, select the Region filter and check the Control visibility using value option and select the DMZ – Display Filter Control field.

Bonus Challenge – Building the Viz

Recreate the viz as described above (or duplicate the sheet of the original viz, and remove all the pills from the Filter shelf.

Bonus challenge – Apply the filtering

Create a parameter

pSelectedRegion

string parameter, defaulted to <empty string>

This parameter is going to contain a string that can contain one or more Regions in a delimited format eg | East | or |East||South| etc. The contents of this string will determine how we filter the chart to mimic the required behaviour.

Firstly, we want the ‘1st level’ filter to determine whether we’re displaying just the West Region or all the other Regions.

Filter Region West or Not v2

(CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion],’West’) AND [Region] = ‘West’)
OR
(NOT CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion], ‘West’) AND [Region] <> ‘West’)

Add this to the Filter shelf and set to True. Show the pSelectedRegion parameter. With the parameter empty, the West Region should not display.

Type the word West into the parameter. Now the just the West Region should display.

And if you enter additional text alongside the word ‘West’, still the ‘West’ Region should display

But if you remove the ‘West’ text, all the Regions should display whatever the text is contained.

This behaviour is essentially simulating that of the ‘West’ | ‘Not West’ parameter selection in the previous version.

Now we want to control the 2nd level of filtering where the same parameter is used to drive which of the ‘other’ Regions display.

Filter Other Regions v2

CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion], ‘West’) OR
NOT CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion],[Region])

Set the pSelectedRegion parameter to empty so all Regions are displayed. Add Filter Other Regions v2 to the Filter shelf and set to True.

Enter the text East into the parameter. The East option should disappear.

Add the text ‘South’. That too should disappear

Add the text ‘West’ and only the West Region will show

Play around entering multiple combinations of Regions. Ultimately if the text ‘West’ is present anywhere in the parameter string, only the West Region will display. If West is not present, then any other Region in the string will not be presented in the display. All sounds a bit backwards, but it works 🙂

So now we need to actually control how the pSelectedRegion parameter will get populated. And this will be via a parameter action fired from the selection made from a ‘custom’ legend sheet.

Bonus challenge – Building the filter control

On a new sheet, add Region to Rows and manually type in MIN(0.0) into Columns. Change the mark type to shape. Add Region to Label and show the labels (widen each row slightly). Edit the MIN(0.0) axis to be fixed from -0.1 to 0.5 which will shift the display to the left.

Sort the Region field by Sales descending.

Hide the axis, stop the Tooltip from displaying, hide the Region header, remove all gridlines/ axis rulers/ zero lines, row/column dividers. Set the background colour to light grey.

The Colour and the Shape (filled or unfilled) is determined based on the entries we have captured in the pSelectedRegion parameter, but the logic for each attribute is different.

Colour v2

If [pSelectedRegion] = ‘|West|’ THEN ‘West’ ELSE [Region] END

Show that parameter and make it empty. Add Colour v2 to the Colour shelf. Adjust colour to suit if not already set.

Then enter the text |West| – all the symbols should now all be Navy (or whatever colour you have chosen for West).

For the shape, create

Shape v2

IF CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion] , ‘West’) AND [Region] = ‘West’ THEN ‘Fill’
ELSEIF CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion], ‘West’) AND [Region] <> ‘West’ THEN ‘Empty’
ELSEIF ([Region] <> ‘West’) AND [pSelectedRegion]=” THEN ‘Fill’
ELSEIF ([Region] <> ‘West’) AND NOT CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion],[Region]) THEN ‘Fill’
ELSE ‘Empty’
END

and add to the Shape shelf. Note – this logic took a lot of trial and error to get the desired result.

Whenever the text West exists in the parameter, then the West Region should be a filled circle and all the other regions should be empty (the first 2 lines of the logic statement). If the parameter is empty, we want all the regions (except West) to be filled (so West will be empty). And if the parameter contains a Region(s) that isn’t West, we want that Region to be empty as well – only non-West Regions that aren’t in the parameter should be filled.

To control the text being passed into the pSelectedRegion parameter, we need a field

Region for Param

IF CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion],’West’) THEN ” //West has been selected again so reset parameter to empty
ELSEIF CONTAINS([pSelectedRegion], [Region]) THEN REPLACE([pSelectedRegion], ‘|’ + [Region] + ‘|’ ,”) //selected region is already in the parameter, so remove it ”
ELSE [pSelectedRegion]+ ‘|’ + [Region] + ‘|’ //append current region selected to the existing parameter string
END

Add this to the Detail shelf.

Finally, we will want to ensure the marks aren’t highlighted on selection, so create fields

True

TRUE

False

FALSE

and add these to the Detail shelf too.

Bonus challenge – adding the interactivity

Build the dashboard again using layout containers and background colours and padding

Create a dashboard parameter action

Set Region

On selection of the Filter Control viz, set the pSelectedRegion parameter passing in the value from the Region for Param field. Set the field to <empty string> when deselected

Create a dashboard filter action

Deselect Marks

On select of the Filter Control viz on the dashboard, target the Filter Control sheet itself, passing in the specific fields of True = False.

And this should complete the required elements. My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Top 5 Product Sales vs Other Products

Donna Coles1 Comment

Erica set this week’s challenge and provided multiple levels specifically aimed a newer users of Tableau. My solution is for Level 3.

Setting up the calculations

First, create a parameter to capture the Sub-Category we care about

pSelectedSubCat

string parameter defaulted to Tables

Create a new field

Is Selected SubCat

[pSelectedSubCat]= [Sub-Category]

then create another field

Product to Display – Step 1

IIF([Is Selected SubCat], [Product Name], ”)

On a new sheet add Sub-Category and Product to Display – Step 1 to Rows. Show the pSelectedSubCat parameter. You will see that the Product rows only show for the Sub Category entered in the pSelectedSubCat parameter

We want to show the average of the product sales for each Sub-Category, so we can create

Sales by Sub Cat & Product

{FIXED [Sub-Category], [Product Name]: SUM([Sales])}

Add this to Text. By default it will aggregate this value to SUM, change it to AVG. For the rows associated to the selected Sub-Category the value of this field is the same whether its SUM or AVG, as it has been calculated at the level of detail being displayed on the row (Sub-Category and Product Name). For the other rows, by changing the aggregation to AVG we are getting the required value, which is essentially the sum of all sales associated to the Sub-Category divided by the number of distinct products. Sort the Sub-Category pill by the Average of the Sales by Sub Cat & Product field descending

Additionally, sort the Product to Display – Step 1 field the same way

We need to identify the top 5 records for the products associated to the selected Sub-Category. We will use a set for this. Right click on Product to Display – Step 1 > Create > Set

Product to Display Set

Select the Top tab and select the top 5 by formula

AVG(IF [Is Selected SubCat] THEN [Sales by Sub Cat & Product] END)

Add this to Rows and you should get In displayed against the product rows with the highest values

With this we can start to think about the ‘other’ text we need to display, but for this we need a handle on the number of products in each Sub-Category. Create

Count Products Per Sub-Category

{FIXED [Sub-Category]: COUNTD([Product Name])}

Add to Text so you can see the value, and then subsequently we can create

Product to Display – Step 2

IF NOT([Is Selected SubCat]) THEN ”
ELSEIF [Product to Display Set] THEN [Product Name]
ELSE ‘Other: ‘ + STR([Count Products Per Sub-Category] – 5) + ‘ Products’
END

Add to Rows to see the behaviour

The viz also needs to show an index value against the top 5 rows, so create

Index to Display

IF MIN([Is Selected SubCat]) AND MIN([Product to Display Set]) THEN STR(INDEX())
ELSE ” END

Add this to Rows as a blue discrete pill in front of the Product to Display – Step 2 field. Adjust the table calculation setting so the Sub-Category field is unchecked.

Next, we’re going to need to display a reference line that is the overall average product sales for the Sub-Category. This may sound like it’s what we already have, but that field is at the Sub-Category and Product Name level of detail, and we need to aggregate this back up to be at the Sub-Category level, so we create

Avg Sales by Sub Cat and Product

{FIXED [Sub-Category]: AVG([Sales by Sub Cat & Product])}

which is the average of the field we previous created but per Sub-Category. Pop this into the table to see what is happening. For the rows where the Products aren’t showing, the values match, but for the rows where the Products are displayed, you get the overall average, which is the same for all the rows.

If we now remove Product to Display – Step 1 from Rows (and amend the Index to Display table calc so it is not longer computing by this field too), we should have the data we expect. Format the Sales by Sub Cat & Product field to be $ with 0 dp.

Building the Viz

On a new sheet add Sub-Category, Product to Display Set, Index to Display and Product to Display – Step 2 to Rows and Sales by Sub Cat & Product to Columns and aggregate to AVG.

Sort the Sub-Category pill by the Average of the Sales by Sub Cat & Product field descending and apply the same sort to the Product to Display – Step 2 field. Edit the table calculation of the Index to Display field so it is not computing by Sub-Category.

Create a new field

Colour

IF [Is Selected SubCat] AND [Product to Display Set] THEN ‘Dark’
ELSEIF [Is Selected SubCat] THEN ‘Light’
ELSE ‘Grey’
END

Add this to Colour shelf and adjust accordingly.

Add Avg Sales by Sub Cat & Product to the Detail shelf, then add a reference line based on the Average of this field

Widen each row and from the Label shelf check Show mark labels. From the Tooltip shelf uncheck Show tooltips.

Hide the In/Out Product to Display Set field in Rows (uncheck show header). Format the font and style of the header columns, then hide the header field labels and hide the axis. Adjust the row banding and set all gridlines, zero lines, axis rulers and column dividers to none. Change the title of the sheet.

Test the behaviour by manually changing the value of the parameter.

Adding the interactivity

Add the sheet to a dashboard, then create a parameter dashboard action

Set SubCat

On select of the viz, update the pSelectedSubCat parameter passing in the value from the Sub-Category field.

My published viz is here

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Datafam Europe Live: London’s Top Attractions

Donna Coles1 Comment

This week’s #WOW2024 challenge was run live at the #Datafam Europe event in London and was a combo with the #PreppinData crew. If you want to have a go at shaping the data required for this challenge yourself, then check out the PreppinData challenge here. Otherwise, you can use the data provided in the excel workbook from the link in the #WOW2024 challenge (I’m building based on this).

Modelling the data

There are 3 data sources for this challenge which we need to relate together. We have

  • Attraction Locations – a list of attractions in London with their lat and long coordinates
  • Tube Locations – a list of tube stations in London with their lat & long coordinates
  • Attraction Footfall – a list of attractions with their annual footfall

Connect to the Excel file and add Attraction Locations to the canvas. Then add Tube Locations and then create a relationship calculation of 1=1 to essentially map every attraction to every tube station.

Then add Attraction Footfall to the canvas and relate it to Attraction Locations by setting Attraction Name = Attraction

Finally, in the viz we have to understand the distance between a selected attraction (the start point) and other attractions (the end point), so we need to have an additional instance of Attraction Locations to be able to generate the information we will need between the start and end. So add another instance of Attraction Locations and set the relationship as Attraction Name <> Attraction Name

To make things a bit easier for reference purposes, rename Attraction Locations to Selected Attraction and Attraction Locations1 to Other Attractions (just right click on the data connection in the canvas to do this).

Building the Footfall Bar Chart

On a new sheet add Attraction Name (from Selected Attraction) to Rows and add 5 Year Avg Footfall to Columns. Change this from SUM to AVG (as the data consists of multiple rows per year and this value is the same for each row associated to an attraction). Sort the chart descending.

Click on the 2 nulls indicator and select to filter the data which will remove the bottom two rows and automatically add 5 Year Avg Footfall to the Filter shelf.

Manually increase the width of each row. Set the format of the 5 Year Avg Footfall to be in millions (M) to 2dp, and then show mark labels and align middle left.

Create a parameter to capture the selected attraction

pSelectedAttraction

string parameter defaulted to St Paul’s Cathedral

show the parameter on the screen.

We need to identify which attraction has been selected, so create

Is Selected Attraction

[Attraction Name]=[pSelectedAttraction]

and then add this to the Colour shelf. Adjust the colours accordingly and set an orange border. Then add Attraction Rank to Rows. Set it to be a discrete dimension (blue pill) and move it to be in front of Attraction Name.

Set the font of the row labels to be navy, hide the row label names (hide field labels for rows), hide the axis (uncheck show header), don’t show tooltips, and remove all row/column dividers, gridlines and zero/axis lines. Set the background of the worksheet to be None (ie transparent). Update the title of the sheet and then name the sheet Footfall or similar.

Building the map

We’re going to use map layers for this, and will build 4 layers

  • the selected attraction
  • the other attractions
  • the tube stations
  • the buffer circle

When using map layers we want to work with spatial data, so we’ll start by creating a point for the selected attraction

Selected Attraction Point

MAKEPOINT([Attraction Latitude], [Attraction Longitude])

Double click on this and it will automatically generate a map. Add Is Selected Attraction to the Filter shelf and set to True so only 1 mark should display, Add Attraction Name to Detail. Show the pSelectedAttraction parameter. Change the mark type to shape and select a filled star. Set the Colour of the shape to navy and add an orange halo. Update the Tooltip.

For the buffer, we need another parameter

pDistance(miles)

float parameter defaulted to 1 that ranges from 0.5 to 2 with a step size of 0.5

Then create

Buffer Attraction (x miles)

BUFFER([Selected Attraction Point], [pDistance(miles)],’mi’)

And drag this onto the canvas and drop when the Add Marks Layer option appears

This will create a new marks layer, which we can rename to Buffer. Reduce the opacity of the colour to 0%. Move the marks layer so it is at the bottom (below the other marks card) , and set the disable selection option so when you move the cursor over the map the buffer circle does not highlight.

Adjust the background layers of the map so only the Postcode Boundaries are visible.

To add the tube stations, we first need to create

Tube Station Point

MAKEPOINT([Station Latitude],[Station Longitude])

Then drag this onto the canvas to create a new marks layer. Add Station to the Detail shelf of this new marks card, and move the marks card so it is below the Selected Attraction marks card.

We don’t want all the stations to display. We just need to show those up to 1.5x the buffer distance, so we need

Distance to Tube Station

DISTANCE([Selected Attraction Point], [Tube Station Point], ‘mi’)

format to a number with 2 dp and then create

Tube Station Within Range

[Distance to Tube Station]<= 1.5 * [pDistance(miles)]

Add this to the Filter shelf and set to True.

We want the size of the displayed stations to differ depending on whether they’re inside the buffer or not, so create

Tube Station Within Buffer

[Distance to Tube Station] <= [pDistance(miles)]

and add this to Size. Change the mark type to circle, then adjust the size as required. Change the colour to orange and add a white border. Add Distance to Tube Station to Tooltip and update. You may want to adjust the size of the shape on the Selected Attraction marks card too, so it’s bigger than the tube stations.

The stations need to be labelled based on the closest x number of stations that are within the buffer. For this we need a parameter

pTop

integer parameter defaulted to 5 that ranges from 5 to 20 with a step size of 1.

We need to rank the stations based on the distance, so create

Station Rank

RANK(SUM([Distance to Tube Station]), ‘asc’)

We’re also going to label the stations with a letter based on their rank

Rank Stations as Letters

CHAR([Station Rank] + 64)

but we only want to show labels for the ‘top’ ranked stations, so create

Label Stations

IF MIN([Tube Station Within Buffer]) AND [Station Rank]<=[pTop] THEN [Rank Stations as Letters] END

and add this to the Label shelf. Adjust the table calculation settings, so the calculation is computing by both Station and Tube Station Within Buffer.

Set the labels to be aligned middle centre, and allow labels to overlap other marks. If things are working as expected, then if you increase the buffer distance to 1.5 miles and the pTop parameter to 20, you should see that not all stations within the buffer circle are labelled

To add the other attractions, we need to create

Other Attraction Point

MAKEPOINT([Attraction Latitude (Attraction Locations1)],[Attraction Longitude (Attraction Locations1)])

and drag this onto the canvas to Add a marks layer. Move this layer so it is beneath the Selected Attraction marks card, and add Attraction Name (from the Other Attractions) section to Detail

Once again, we want to limit what attractions display, so need

Distance to Other Attraction

DISTANCE([Selected Attraction Point], [Other Attraction Point], ‘mi’)

and then

Other Attraction Within Range

[Distance to Other Attraction]<= 1.5 * [pDistance(miles)]

and add this to the Filter shelf and set to True.

Add Distance to Other Attraction to the Tooltip shelf and update. Change the mark type to shape. The shape needs to differ whether it’s within the top x closest attractions that’s inside the buffer or not. So we need

Rank Other Attractions

RANK(SUM([Distance to Other Attraction]), ‘asc’)

and then

Top X Attraction in Buffer

IF [Rank Other Attractions] <= [pTop] AND MIN([Other Attraction within Buffer]) THEN MIN([Attraction Name (Attraction Locations1)])
ELSE ‘Not Top X’
END

Add this to the Shape shelf. Set the table calculation so it is computing explicitly by both Attraction Name and Other Attraction Within Buffer. Setting the specific shape for each of the named attractions that could show is fiddly, so I just chose to leave as per the default values listed. The only shape I explicitly set was the Not Top X which I set to a filled circle. I set the colour of the shapes to dark grey and added a halo of the same colour to make the shape more prominent. The shapes also need to differ in size based on whether they are in the buffer or not, so need

Other Attraction Within Buffer

[Distance to Other Attraction] <= [pDistance(miles)]

Add to the Size shelf and then adjust sizes to suit.

Set the background of the worksheet to None, remove all row/column dividers and name the sheet Map or similar. Finally remove all the Map Options (Map > Map Options > uncheck all selections) to prevent to toolbar from displaying on hover. Test the map functionality by changing the various parameters and entering a new starting location.

Note – in subsequent testing I found that for some attractions where there were either no tube stations or other attractions within the range, the map would disappear. If I get time I’m going to try to work on a solution for this, but I’ll leave as is for now (Lorna’s published solution has the same issue).

Building the Tube Station Rank Bar

On a new sheet add Station to Rows and Distance to Tube Station to Columns. Add Is Selected Attraction to Filter and set to True. Sort the chart ascending, so closet is listed first.

We only want to display the stations that are within the buffer, so add Tube Station Within Buffer to Filter and set to True.

We also want to restrict this list to just those that are the closest ‘x’ to the attraction based on the pTop parameter. Add Station to the Filter shelf and on the General tab, select Use all and then select the Top tab and add the condition to display the bottom pTop by Distance to Tube Station.

However, this doesn’t quite show the correct results, as the Top n filtering has been applied BEFORE the other filters on the shelf. To resolve this we need to add Is Selected Attraction and Tube Station Within Buffer to context (right click each pill on the filter shelf).

Add Station and Distance to Tube Station to the Label shelf, and adjust the label to display the text as required and align middle left. Change the mark type to bar and manually widen the width of each row so the labels are readable. Adjust the colour of the bars.

For the circle labels, we need a ‘fake’ axis – double click into Columns and manually type MIN(-0.05). Move the pill that is created to be in front of the Distance to Tube Station pill.

Change the mark type of the MIN(-0.05) pill to circle and remove the fields from the Label shelf. Add Rank Stations as Letters to the Label shelf instead and adjust the table calculation so it is explicitly computing by Station. Format the label and align middle centre.

Make the chart dual axis and synchronise the axis. Remove Measure Names from the All marks card.

Don’t show the Tooltip, remove all row/column dividers, hide the axis and the Station column. Hide all gridlines, axis lines, zero lines. Format the background of the workbook to be None (ie transparent).

Update the title of the sheet referencing the parameters as required, and name the sheet Tube Station Rank Bar or similar.

Building the Tube Station Rank Bar

On a new sheet add Attraction Name (from the Other Attractions data set) to Rows and Distance to Other Attraction to Columns. Add Is Selected Attraction to Filter and set to True. Sort the chart ascending, so closet is listed first.

We only want to display the other attractions that are within the buffer, so add Other Attraction Within Buffer to Filter and set to True.

We also want to restrict this list to just those that are the closest ‘x’ to the attraction based on the pTop parameter. Add Attraction Name to the Filter shelf, on the General tab, select Use all and then select the Top tab and add the condition to display the bottom pTop by Distance to Other Attraction.

Add Is Selected Attraction and Other Attraction Within Range to context.

Add Attraction Name (from the Other Attractions data set) and Distance to Other Attraction to the Label shelf, and adjust the label to display the text as required and align middle left. Change the mark type to bar and manually widen the width of each row so the labels are readable. Adjust the colour of the bars.

Double click into Columns and manually type MIN(-0.1). Move the pill that is created to be in front of the Distance to Other Attraction pill.

Change the mark type of the MIN(-0.1) pill to shape and remove the fields from the Label shelf. Add Attraction Name to the Shape shelf. Set the colour of the shape. Edit the shape for each Attraction so it matches the shapes assigned to the attractions on the Map sheet. Unfortunately, this is a bit fiddly and just a case of trial and error which involves changing the parameters to try to ensure all the options are presented at least once of each of the charts. There is probably a better way, but I’d have to rebuild something so sorry!

Make the chart dual axis and synchronise the axis. Remove Measure Names from the All marks card.

Don’t show the Tooltip, remove all row/column dividers, hide the axis and the Attraction Name column. Hide all gridlines, axis lines, zero lines. Format the background of the workbook to be None (ie transparent).

Update the title of the sheet referencing the parameters as required, and name the sheet Tube Attraction Rank Bar or similar.

Adding the interactivity

Add the sheets onto the dashboard making use of layout containers to get the objects positioned where required. Format the dashboard to set the background to the light peach colour. How I’ve organised the content is show by the item hierarchy below

Create a parameter dashboard action

Select attraction

On select of the footfall bar chart, set the pSelectedAttraction parameter with the value from the Attraction Name field. Keep the value when the mark is deselected.

And at this point, you should hopefully now have a functioning dashboard. My published version is here.

Happy vizzin!

Donna

Can you switch a dashboard theme?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

This week’s #WOW2024 challenge was a guest post by Tomoki Goda. The main focus of the challenge was to be able to switch between light and dark mode, but there’s so much more going on, this blog could take a while!

I also have to admit, I didn’t manage to complete this without help and also looking at the solution workbook. It may be if I’d left it and come back to it another time I’d have figured it out, but time is so precious at the moment, it was more likely if I’d left it, I would have struggled to return to it, and then this blog wouldn’t have got written either. But I’ve learned something, so that’s the win in my book 🙂

Setting up the parameters

There are 3 parameters required for this challenge.

pTheme

This parameter will control the mode to display and I set it as a boolean parameter defaulted to true and aliased as True = Light Theme and False = Dark Theme

pRegion

This parameter will capture the Region associated to the KPI the user has interacted with on the dashboard. This is a string parameter defaulted to <empty string>

pCategory

This parameter will capture the Category associated to the Category Sales bar chart that the user has interacted with on the dashboard. This is a string parameter defaulted to <empty string>.

Building the Region KPI chart

ON a new sheet ad Region to Rows and then double click into the Rows shelf manually type MIN(1.0) to create a fake axis. Increase the Size to the largest possible and set the view to Entire View.

Change the Mark Type to Bar. Add Region to the Label shelf. Format the Sales field to be $K to 1 dp and also add to the Label shelf. Adjust the font size and align middle centre. Edit the MIN(1.0) axis to be fixed from -0.2 to 1.2 to allow some spacing between the colour blocks.

Show the pRegion and pTheme parameters. Add Order Date to the Filter shelf and choose Years , then select all years, Show the Year filter and display as a single value list.

Create a new field

Is Selected Region

[Region] = [pRegion]

Add this to the Colour shelf.

Also create a new field

Show Light Theme

[pTheme]

Add this to the Detail shelf initially, then select the ‘hierarchy’ symbol to the left of the pill and change the symbol to the Colour one – this will add two pills to the colour shelf

Drag the Show Light Theme pill so it is listed above the Is Selected Region pill. Enter the name of a Region into the pRegion parameter (eg East), and then adjust the colours for when pTheme=Light Theme is selected

Now change the pTheme parameter so Dark Theme is selected and adjust the colours again

Hide the Region field and the axis (uncheck show header). Don’t show the Tooltip. Hide all row/column dividers, gridlines, zero lines, axis rulers and axis ticks. Set the border on the colour shelf to None, and most importantly, set the worksheet background colour to None (ie it’s transparent). This will become noticeable later when we add the content to the dashboard.

Finally we will need some additional fields which will help with the interactivity on the dashboard later, when we don’t want the marks that have not been selected to ‘fade’.

Region for Param

IIF( [pRegion]=[Region],””, [Region])

True

TRUE

False

FALSE

Add all 3 fields to the Detail shelf. Name the sheet Region Sales KPI.

Building the Category by Sales bar chart

On a new sheet add Category to Rows. Then go back to the Region Sales KPI sheet and set the Year(Order Date) filter to apply to worksheet > selected worksheets > and select the relevant sheet.

Now, I had a couple of attempts at building this. From what I could tell, the Category label wasn’t a usual ‘row heading’, as we needed to give it a specific coloured background on selection. It also had to be built within the same sheet, as the same technique was applied to the Sales by Sub-Category bar chart which was a scrollable section. I tried using a dual axis of Sales and Regional Sales in conjunction with a ‘fake’ axis for the header, but found the width of the fake axis had to match the width of the dual axis, so my header section was too wide. After a lot of trial and error, I ultimately had to ask my colleague, Sam Parsons, if he could figure it out, which he did in 5 minutes using dual axis and Measure Names.

Add Sales to Columns and sort descending. Show the pRegion, pCategory and pTheme parameters and ensure pRegion has a value (eg East).

Create a new field

Selected Region Sales

IF [Region] = [pRegion] THEN [Sales] END

format this to $k to 1dp, and then drag onto the canvas and drop on the Sales axis when the two ‘green column’ icon appears.

This will automatically add Measure Names and Measure Values into the view. Move Measure Names from Rows to the Colour shelf, and also add another instance of Measure Names to the Size shelf. Add Show Light Theme to the Detail shelf, and then set to be an additional field on the Colour shelf. Move it so it is listed above the Measure Names colour pill. Adjust colours of the bars for the light and dark them modes as before.

Reorder the measures in the Size legend box so Selected Region Sales is listed first and so is smaller. Manually increase the width of each row, and then adjust the sizes from the size legend so the difference between the bar widths is not so great.

Create a new field

Label Splitter

IF [pRegion] <> ” THEN ‘ / ‘ END

and add this, Sales and Selected Region Sales to the Label shelf. Arrange the pills as required, align middle left and ensure Allow labels to overlap other marks is selected

Set the pRegion parameter to <empty string> and verify the label displays as expected, Hide the Null indicator. Update the Tooltip as required.

For the header, we need another measure we can use which is on the same axis as the Measure Values, but is negative, so it sits to the left of the bars we already have.

Header Plot

Window_MAX(SUM([Sales])) * -0.25

This takes the maximum value of the Sales bar that is displayed in the chart and applies a proportion, so we don’t need to attempt to ‘fix’ the axis in anyway. Add this to Columns, set to dual axis and then synchronise axis. Set the mark type on the All marks card to bar. You’ll probably have something like…

On the Header Plot marks card, remove the three fields on the Label self, and add Category to the Label shelf instead.

Enter the name of a Category into the pCategory parameter (eg Technology). Create a new field

Is Selected Cat

[Category] = [pCategory]

and drag this and drop it directly onto the Measure Names pill that is on the Colour shelf of the Header Plot marks card. Adjust the colours as required, changing the pTheme parameter to dark mode too.

Delete the text from the Tooltip of the Header Plot marks card.

Hide the Category field and the axis (uncheck show header). Don’t show the Tooltip. Hide all row/column dividers, gridlines, zero lines, axis rulers and axis ticks. Set the border on the colour shelf to None, and once again, most importantly, set the worksheet background colour to None (ie it’s transparent).

The title of the sheet will also need to change colour when the mode differs, so create

Title Light

IIF([Show Light Theme],”Sales by Category”,””)

Also create

Show Dark Theme

NOT([pTheme])

and then

Title Dark

IIF([Show Dark Theme],”Sales by Category”,””)

Add Title Light and Title Dark to the Detail shelf of the All marks card and then update the title of the sheet so both pills are listed and coloured based on the mode – the text for Title Light should be black and the text for Title Dark should be white (though at this point you won’t see this show up when you change the mode).

Finally, as before, we will need some additional fields which will help with the interactivity on the dashboard later, when we don’t want the marks that have not been selected to ‘fade’.

Category for Param

IIF( [pCategory]=[Category],””, [Category])

Add this and True and False to the Detail shelf of the All marks card. Label the sheet Sales by Cat or similar.

Building the Sub-Category by Sales bar chart

The simplest way to build this sheet is to start by duplicating the Category by Sale bar chart sheet, and then drag Sub-Category and drop it directly on top of the Category pill on the Rows shelf. Re-sort by Sales descending.

On the Header Plot marks card, also drag Sub-Category and drop it directly onto the Category pill on the Text shelf.

Manually increase the width of each row and then hide the Sub-Category column (uncheck Show Header)

Create new fields

Title Light Sub Cat

IIF([Show Light Theme],”Sales by Sub-Category”,””)

and then

Title Dark Sub Cat

IIF([Show Dark Theme],”Sales by Sub-Category”,””)

and drag these to directly on top of the Title Light and Title Dark pills on the Detail shelf of the All marks card. Update the title of the sheet to reference these new pills.

Name the sheet Sales by Sub Cat or similar.

Building the rounded borders

The rounded borders displayed on the dashboard are based on utilising annotations on a ‘dummy’ sheet, as described in these blog posts (here and here).

I created a new field

Dummy

“”

And added this to the Detail shelf on a new sheet. I set the background of the worksheet to none, the mark type to polygon and the sheet to entire view. I then added an annotation, resized it to be as large as possible, and set the properties so the shading was set to none, the corners to very rounded and a dark thin border was applied.

I named this sheet Rounded Edge Light 1. I then duplicated to create a 2nd one and named it Rounded Edge Light 2. I then duplicated again, but this time changed the shading of the annotation to be dark grey/ brown, and named this sheet Rounded Edge Dark 1

Duplicate this sheet again and name Rounded Edge Dark 2.

We now have all the components needed to build the dashboard.

Building the core dashboard

Start by creating the layout for the 3 core ‘chart’ sheets and the parameter/filter controls. I used a combination of horizontal and vertical layout containers and adjusted padding to get the layout required. The image below shows how I laid out the display in the item hierarchy section. Note that all the background of all the containers and the objects on the dashboard are set to None (ie transparent).

Adding the rounded borders

With the theme set to Light Theme, set the option to be Floating and drag on the Rounded Edge Light 1 sheet and position it over the Sales by Category chart. Adjust the height and width until you’re happy, and remove the sheet title. From the context menu of the object, set the floating order so the border sheet is ‘behind’ the bar chart (send backward). This allows the bars to still be clicked on and interacted with.

Then with the border object still selected, set the visibility to only show when Show Light Theme is true

Repeat the same process with the Rounded Edge Light 2 sheet, floating it over the top of the Sales by Sub-Category bar chart.

Then switch the theme to Dark Theme. The borders should disappear. Now repeat the above process with the two Rounded Edge Dark sheets, but this time when controlling the visibility of each sheet, select the Show Dark Theme field instead.

If you’ve followed the steps, you hopefully should have something that looks like

Setting the overall dark background

The final step to get the completely dark background is to float a blank object onto the dashboard. Resize the blank object to be positioned at 0,0 and sized 1000 x 800 (ie the same size as the dashboard)

Adjust the floating order of this object and this time set it to Send to Back so it is the very bottom ‘layer’. Then set the background colour of the blank object to the relevant dark brown/grey colour, and then finally set the visibility to only display when Show Dark Theme is true.

Test the display by switching the theme in the parameter.

Adding the interactivity

We need multiple dashboard actions to control the behaviour of the dashboard.

Set Region

Parameter dashboard action that on select of the Region Sales KPI sheet only, sets the pRegion parameter with the value from the Region for Param field.

Set Category

Parameter dashboard action that on select of the Sales by Cat sheet only, sets the pCategory parameter with the value from the Category for Param field.

KPI Deselect

Dashboard filter action that on select of the Region Sales KPI sheet on the dashboard targets the Region Sales KPI sheet directly passing the fields that set True = False.

Set Category Deselect

Dashboard filter action that on select of the Sales by Cat sheet on the dashboard targets the Sales by Cat sheet directly passing the fields that set True = False.

Set Sub-Cat Deselect

Dashboard filter action that on select of the Sales by Sub  Cat sheet on the dashboard targets the Sales by Sub Cat sheet directly passing the fields that set True = False.

And with all this, hopefully you have a fully interactive workbook. My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Can you create multi-select parameters?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

For this week’s #WOW2024 challenge, Kyle simulated a real-world challenge he’s faced at work where he wanted the ability to select multiple parameters as he was sourcing data from multiple data sources, so using traditional filters didn’t work.

Connecting to the data

The challenge required connecting to the Superstore data twice but applying a data source filter to each connection to restrict the Order Date to Year 2023 or 2024.

After making the 1st connection and filtering to 2023, I renamed the data source and appended 2023.

I then added a data source and made the 2nd connection to Superstore, this time adding a data source filter to 2024. I then renamed this data source and appended 2024. So I ended up with 2 data sources at the top of the data pane window.

Building the line charts

Starting with the Superstore – 2023 data source, put Order Date on columns and change to be the continuous (green) Week number option. Add Sales to Rows.

Then

  • format Sales to be $ with 0 dp
  • format Order Date to be mmm dd custom date format
  • to match the solution, set the Date Property of the data source to start a week on Sunday (right click data source > date properties)
  • Remove the titles against both axis
  • adjust the Tooltip
  • Remove all gridlines, zero lines, axis rulers & axis ticks
  • Name the sheet 2023 Sales

Create a new sheet, and the repeat all the steps but source the fields from the Superstore 2024 data source.

Building the Category Selection

On a new sheet, manually type MIN(1) into the Columns and add Category from the Superstore 2023 data source to Rows. Amend the axis to fix it from 0 to 1. Set to Entire View. Increase the Size to 100%. Add Category to Label. Adjust the font and align centrally. Hide the Category headers and the Min(1) axis. Remove the Tooltip.

To build the multi-select parameters, we’re going to use a sheet to capture the interactions the user makes into a parameter that will store a delimited string of selected values. This is using the same principles discussed in a previous challenge I created and blogged about here.

We need a parameter

pSelectedCategories

string parameter defaulted to empty string

We’ll use a parameter action to capture the user selection and add it into the pSelectedCategories parameter.

When using delimited strings, you need to choose a character to separate the field values that isn’t going to appear within the field value itself; ie choose a character that won’t appear within a Category name. In this instance I’m choosing | (pipe), and I’m going to build up the parameter as follows

ActionpSelectedCategoriesDisplay
Initial state<empty string>All Categories selected – coloured green
1 category selected eg Furniture|Furniture|Furniture is green, others categories grey
2 categories selected eg Furniture then Office Supplies|Furniture||Office Supplies|Furniture & Office Supplies are green, Technology is grey
3 categories selected eg Furniture, then Office Supplies, then Technology|Furniture||Office Supplies||Technology|All Categories selected – coloured green
Existing category is selected again eg Office Supplies|Furniture||Technology|Furniture & Technology are green, Office Supplies is grey

We need a calculated field to populate the parameter, which will get modified by comparing what’s already in the parameter with the Category being selected.

In the Superstore 2023 data source create

Category for Param

IF CONTAINS([pSelectedCategories], [Category]) THEN REPLACE([pSelectedCategories],’|’ + [Category] + ‘|’, ”) //selected category is already in the parameter, so remove it
ELSE [pSelectedCategories] + ‘|’ + [Category] + ‘|’ //append current category selected to the existing parameter string
END

Add Category for Param to the Detail shelf.

We need to set the colour of the bars. Show the pSelectedCategories parameter and manually type in |Furniture|

Then create

Category is Selected

[pSelectedCategories] = ” OR
CONTAINS([pSelectedCategories], [Category])

Add this to the colour shelf, and adjust the colours accordingly

Remove the text from the pSelectedCategories parameter, and all the bars should be green.

Format the bars so there is a light grey thick row divider, and set the background of the worksheet to the same light grey. Reduce the Size slightly, so there is a noticeable gap between the bars.

When added to the dashboard, we won’t want the unselected bars to ‘fade’, so we’ll use the True/False trick, which means we’ll need to create

True

TRUE

False

FALSE

and add both these fields to the Detail shelf.

Name the sheet Category.

Building the Region and Ship Mode Selections

Basically repeat the above steps on a separate sheet for each selector. You may find it easier to duplicate the Category sheet and then replace the various fields.

You’ll need to create a pSelectedRegions and a pSelectedShipModes parameter, and calculated Region for Param, Region Is Selected and Ship Mode for Param and ShipMode Is Selected calculated fields.

Name the new sheets Region and Ship Mode.

Filtering the line charts

On the 2023 Sales sheet, add Category Is Selected, Region Is Selected and Ship Mode Is Selected to the Filter shelf, and set all to be True.

Switch to the 2024 Sales sheet.

Recreate the 3 ‘Is Selected’ fields in the Superstore 2024 data source. You can either do this manually, or select the fields in the Superstore 2023 data source (ctl-click to multi-select), the right click and Copy

then switch to the 2024 Sales sheet, and right-click anywhere in the right hand data pane and paste.

Then add each of the fields to the filter shelf and set to True.

Adding the interactivity

Make sure all the parameters are empty, then add all the objects to a dashboard. I used a vertical layout container to place the Selector objects, as I could then set them to be distributed evenly. I also set the background of the layout container to the same light grey as the worksheet, and centrally aligned all the sheet titles.

6 dashboard actions are required, 2 for each selector.

Select Categories

Parameter action that on select of the Category sheet, sets the pSelectedCategories parameter with the value from the Category for Param field.

Deselect Categories

Filter dashboard action that on select of the Category sheet on the dashboard, targets the actual Category sheet, passing the values of True = False.

Create a version of each of these dashboard actions for the Region sheet and the Ship Mode sheet, and that should complete the challenge.

My published version is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna

Can you combine part-to-whole and comparison?

Donna ColesLeave a comment

Sean’s #WOW2024 challenge this week was to visualise the comparisons between different entities within a limited space, by using a Viz In Tooltip (VIT) to provide additional information on hover.

Building the Treemap

Add Sales to Size, Category to Colour and Sub-Category to Detail to create the basic tree map. Tableau will automatically define the layout based on the space available, and you can’t control this, so don’t worry if it doesn’t match the final output.

Move Sub-Category from Detail to Label and add Sales to Label too. Format Sales to to be $ at 0dp, then adjust the Label as required.

Crete a new field

Rank

RANK(SUM([Sales]))

Format the field so it is formatted to be a whole number with a suffix of .)

Convert to discrete and add to the Detail shelf. Adjust the table calculation and verify it is computing by both Category and Sub-Category – this ranks every cell from 1 to 17 based on the Sales.

Adjust the Tooltip to just show the Category, Sub-Category and Sales data.

Name the sheet TreeMap.

Building the bar chart (the VIT)

On a new sheet add Sub-Category to Rows and Sales to Columns. Sort by Sales descending. Add Category to Colour and adjust the opacity to around 30%. Manually widen each row.

Add Sales and Sub-Category to Label and adjust to get the correct layout and then align left middle.

Add Rank to Rows after Sub-Category. Hide the Sub-Category field (uncheck show header).

We need to identify a row that has been ‘selected’ by the user. For this we need a parameter

pSelectedRank

Integer parameter defaulted to 0

Show the parameter on the page. We need to indicate which row is selected.

Selected Rank Indicator

IF [Rank] = [pSelectedRank] THEN ‘●’ ELSE ” END

Add this field to Rows before Rank, then update the pSelectedRank parameter to a valid number, eg 5.

Hide field labels for rows, make the Selected Rank Indicator and Rank columns narrower. Adjust alignment of columns and increase the font size of the Selected Rank Indicator column.

Hide the Sales axis, remove all gridlines, zero lines and row & column dividers. Format the Row Axis Ruler to be a black line.

We only want a subset of the rows to show – those that are 2 below and 2 above the selected rank. Create a new field

Rank in Range

([Rank] >= [pSelectedRank]-2) AND ([Rank]<= [pSelectedRank]+2)

Add this to Rows in front of Sub-Category. The bar chart will split.

We only want to see the ‘True’ rows. You can do this in 2 ways.

1 – Click on the word True and select Keep Only from the dialog box displayed. This will add Rank in Range to the Filter shelf

or

2 – right click on the section with the False records and select Hide from the context menu. The rows associated to False will disappear but won’t actually be filtered out of the view (this is what I did)

Hide the Rank in Range column from showing (uncheck show header). Name this sheet VIT or similar.

On the TreeMap sheet, update the Tooltip to show the VIT worksheet (via Insert > Sheets). Adjust the code snipped inserted so the filter property = “” (ie no filters are passed and the complete viz is displayed).

If you test it from the worksheet, and still have the pSelectedRank set to 5, you should see the same set of bars regardless of which part of the TreeMap you hover on.

Applying the filter

Create a dashboard of the required size and add the TreeMap sheet. Set the viz to fit entire view. It’s likely it will now rearrange itself to (nearly) match the solution.

Add a parameter dashboard action to set the selected rank

Set Rank

On hover of the TreeMap sheet, set the pSelectedRank parameter by passing in the value from the Rank field aggregated to nothing. When the selection is cleared, set to 0.

Hovering over the dashboard should now update the display in the VIT to ‘focus’ on whichever Sub-Category has been selected on the TreeMap.

My published viz is here.

Happy vizzin’!

Donna