Tableau

Opmerkingen: I have worked on domains like Telecom and Network where in I have been using Tableau. Its really liked by senior management as it shows each and every bit very clearly to relevant stake holders. For example, Marketing head likes region wise revenue sale dashboard which gives region/sales manager/product wise sale.

Pluspunten: There are many features which lot of users would have liked:-
1. Connection to almost all database
2. Many types of Charts can be created including Sankey, Doughnut, Maps etc.
3. Its has the feature of data blending and data extraction
4. Dashboards can be viewed on multiple devices like tablet, mobile and laptops.
5. Its really fast while drilling down or filtering out from any dashboard.

Minpunten: Its a bit expensive tool as compared to other data visualization tools however its a value for money.

Opmerkingen: We used Tableau for Visualization BI apart from having Business Objects for reporting. We have created a story for a given subject with all the related information to present to the user. It gives a quick glance on what is happening on the sales of drug for a pharma company that I worked. Migration from non-prod to prod is very easy (unlike other BI tools). Cost of the project reduces a lot with Tableau for BI projects

Pluspunten: Tableau has changed the BI world a lot. It has brought in a software, using with business user can create dashboard & reports on the fly and can check what is there inside. It allows the user to read through the data and derive the insights without much technical analysis. First it can connect to any database (I know about 44 database it connects) and you can set the data, slice the data needed for current analysis and then you can do quick reporting. It provide multiple features, like different charts, graphs and tables and mathematical and statistical functions for analysis. Once you have create multiple visuals you can put them onto one dashboard or multiple dashboards into a story and present the same to business

Minpunten: Even though it has rich features but it can support the Enterprise BI needs like business object or Cognos does. It does not provide all the feature for E L T (extraction, load and transform) which requires complex transactions. As data gets huge the graphs and charts become unreadable. also, this software is more useful to the business user for personal purpose than company wide reporting etc. The administration part of it needs a lot.

Opmerkingen: Tableau and especially Tableau server has helped our business share data much more efficiently and accurately than the old method of emailing spreadsheets and presentations around. The ability for anyone to manipulate the data and answer their own questions allows analysts to concentrate on the truly difficult and unique problems instead of cranking out a never-ending series of custom reports. Having the data connected to live source or warehoused data means everyone is up to date all the time.

Pluspunten: Tableau is exceptionally easy to pick up and be productive, and has the ability to connect to almost any data source you can imagine, including REST APIs (though this is a pretty advanced process). Cross database joins are an amazing feature that allow you to mix data from Excel, Oracle, MySQL and others on a single dashboard. There are a ton of online resources available from Tableau, and the broader user community which help you in the event that you get stuck on a thorny issue. Tableau also supports the Tableau Public desktop software which allows anyone to create and share visualizations for free on the web (though data sources are severely limited with Tableau Public).

Minpunten: Price is an issue, particularly if you're an individual or a small business. Woe be unto you if you're a small business and you'd like to set up a Tableau server. There are some functions which we've all grown accustomed to in Excel which new users will expect to be in Tableau but just aren't--robust Conditional Formatting, for instance. However, in most cases there are workarounds and other ways of accomplishing the same task. While it's easy to become quickly productive, most users will outgrow the easy stuff pretty quickly as they attempt join new data sources, or produce more complicated visualizations.

Opmerkingen: Overall, Tableau is a fantastic program for getting automated reports created, published, and off your plate! The visuals are amazing and the subscriptions and alert system are my absolute favorite. The software has its quirks but I've yet to have a problem I couldn't logically program my way around with a little time spent on web forums. Amazing software, very useful, exciting to use!

Pluspunten: I love Tableau because, to me, there is almost nothing else out there that does data visualization so quickly and so effectively. I love that you can import almost any kind of data source (I only use SQL or Excel as sources, but there are hundreds of other options). I love that you can then add your own calculated fields, group data into custom buckets, and create parameters which the user can input on the published workbook. I love that you can visualize the data so quickly and in so many ways (with color and shape/size as further attributes). It's like a pivot chart in Excel but so much more agile to use! Finally, I love that you can then build dashboards with these individual reports/worksheets that you create, publish them onto the web, and essentially "set it and forget it," thereby providing your end users with future reporting that is automatic and requires no further work on your end! The real beauty is the creation of alerts and subscriptions, which can email users on a schedule or depending on certain conditions. That's when life really gets exciting--it's like having a full-time robot managing your processes!

Minpunten: I definitely wish Tableau could write back to a database. That would be amazing. I've heard it's in the works, but for now, it's still just on my wish list. I dislike various aspects about Tableau that can make it quite tricky to use. When you publish a data source, you should really publish it first before creating any calculated fields, groups, or parameters. Otherwise, it becomes much more difficult to edit these fields later as you have to re-download the published data source to make your edits to those fields, and then republish your data source, which results in my having to ask IT to re-input the server refresh password to get the data to refresh on a schedule again. This is a tremendous headache. So it's best to create and save new fields at the workbook level, not the data source level. There are also a great many bugs I still run into with Tableau from time to time. Strange behaviors that show me it was created by a human being, as all software is. There is usually a way to figure out a workaround but you have to get creative. Tableau is quirky, for sure. Some actions in the local program work great but don't necessarily translate to the web form. For example, if you create a calculated field that depends on data from two different sources, that works great locally, but it doesn't work well once you publish those data sources to the Tableau Server, because, for some reason, it does not allow the calculation to draw from the separately published data.

Opmerkingen: It took me some time to understand the scope and approach of Tableau. During this time i was confused and sometimes frustrated as It was hard to get static reports out of tableau. Once however I understood the magic behind it (well actually it wasn't Tableaus fault, but just me being stubborn) a whole new world of analyzing data opened up. A Magnificent, splendid, dynamic and playful way of getting answers from data and a completely new way of thinking questions to ask from my data. If you do not have to create static reports which you want to mail daily to a bunch of people but want to explre the secrets your data holds This is THE tool. Definite recommendation.

Pluspunten: Tableau is centered around you as a user asking questions to your data. It is as simple as that and it works in ways not imagined before. Via graphical user antierface and drag and drop you combine aspects of your data and visualize relations. The coolest thing is that Tableau supports you without pushing or distracting. The process is emergent and makes it possible to walk the line from coherence to causality and have fun along the way. The End results look great and can be reformated by a couple of clicks in order to shift perspective or look from a different angle or with a different point of interest towards your findings. Tableu picks you up where you are and you can run it as SAAS or on premise, depending on your preferences. Also the API is simple and powerful, making the integration as a dedicated reporting and statistcs module, or more precise data visualisation playground to your existing product easy and convenient. By doing so you can add tableaus product-versatility, ease of use and beauty to a product and participate from its user friendly and open aproach to data analysis.

Minpunten: The licensing was a bit of a hassle as we started in the early days of tableau. Also Sales were very eager and pretty actively tried to support us. This never was a bad thing, just a bit too much. Also Tableau introduced support for document based databases rather later than earlier so we had a slight wait there. Then again, every time the did include a feature it was just bug free and worked like a charm so this was allright as well.
Two things are especially important when evaluating Tableau, from my point of view: The data you whish to process with it must adhere to a minimal standard (or you will have to do a lot of conversion before you can enjoy it within tableau). So older datasources might become somewhat bothersome or at least require a preprocessing step. Most important is that you understand what tableau is for: You will have a great time when dynamically and actively exploring data, even rapidly changing data or real time streams. If you use a tool for creating static reports you waste the potential of this great piece of human engineering and might run into issues.