I am back from San Diego where I attended Tableau Conference 2024. For me the conference has always been about reconnecting with the community, sharing content and meeting the product team. This year was certainly no different.
I want to say a massive thank you to ALL Tableau staff for putting on a really fantastic conference. The title of this blog is "Tableau is Back!", and I really truly mean that. It felt like it was back to the good days, the pre-covid days. Where Salesforce took a step back and let Tableau continue to be its own entity. And I'm here for it! As are a lot of the other Tableau Visionaries and Ambassadors.
This year Tableau had a whopping 200+ breakout sessions, 60+ hands-on trainings, 1 keynotes (more on that later) and the biggest data viz competition of Iron Viz Final. If you don't know what Iron Viz is, definitely go and check it out!
Let's start with the Keynotes. The keynote was on the second day of the three day conference, which felt a little strange, but it was jam packed with a lot of content. I really liked seeing how Tableau currently sees the data landscape and refers to it as Waves of Analytics.
Wave 1: Full Service - in the past required coding skills to work with data
Wave 2: Self-service - users wanted to generate their own insights using tools like Tableau
Wave 3: Personalisation (current) - AI has changed how users experience their data and the demands they have of it
Then Tableau went into the future of what Tableau with Wave 4
Wave 4: The next generation of Tableau = real-time cloud-scale data, semantics for trusted insights, actionable insights, reusable and composable assets (launching at Dreamforce)
Personally, I still don't think a lot of companies are in Wave 2 let alone moving into Wave 3, if you feel like you're still in Wave 1 or 2, contact us and we can help you with this transition.
But for me the biggest buzz of keynote is ALWAYS Devs on Stage! A selection of Tableau Develops are chosen to present some of the newest (mostly unreleased) features in front of a big audience.
The key features for me are:
Tableau Public Local Save
Custom Style Themes & Google based fonts
Pulse enhancements
Sentiment Analysis in Tableau Prep
Composable Data Sources
Viz Extensions
The composable data sources has been a feature that has been wanted for a very long time, it will essentially allow you to have relationships with PUBLISHED DATA SOURCES! And I can't wait to have that available towards the end of this year!
Suggested Catch Up Sessions
Highlights
Community
How to Do Cool Stuff in Tableau
Dashboard Design Tips: Information Buttons & Toggle Switches
Wow! Did You See That KPI Dashboard?
At the Speed of Iron Viz: Tips for Faster Builds
Harness the Power of Design for Better Business Dashboards
Product
New Multi-Fact Analyses Using the Tableau Data Model
Bring Your Own Viz Type: Enhance Tableau with Viz Extensions
Pulse Check: Is Your Tableau Setup Fit and Healthy for AI?