WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

TUTORIAL

Get Started with Tableau Desktop

Learn how to connect to data, create data visualizations, present your findings, and share
your insights with others.
This tutorial walks you through features and functions of Tableau Desktop. As you work
through this tutorial, you will create three views in a Tableau workbook. The steps you'll take
is based on a Rubbery Squeezy Chicken data set from the University of Arkansas Enterprise
System group in the Information Systems Department.
Dataset Overview:

The dataset has a total of 100,240 records and 87 attributes distributed among 12 tables.
This tutorial shows you how to:
1. Connect directly to the WCOB_RSC dataset residing on the TERADATA system.
2. Prepare the dataset before working on it.
3. Create three visualizations based on an investigation of transaction amounts.
NOTE: This tutorial assumes you have been granted access to the University of Arkansas
VMWare platform. Requesting access can be done from the Enterprise Systems website at
the University of Arkansas (https://walton.uark.edu/enterprise/). The data used should not be
downloaded to your personal drives. All files should remain on the Remote Desktop S: drive
provided by the University of Arkansas. This is due to our agreement with the data providers.
Questions can be directed to Ron Freeze at [email protected].
http://onlinehelp.tableau.com/current/guides/get-started-tutorial/en-us/get-started-tutorial- home.html
ESTIMATED COMPLETION TIME: 20-40 minutes

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

The Story
Suppose you were recently hired as an analyst in the merchandising department of the most
important toy company in the United States. Your boss assigned you a unique product:
Rubbery Squeezy Chickens. Your objective is to find three different insights for this specific
product.
Initially, you are interested in visualizing the total quantity sold and sale amount by the
different manufacturing plants where the rubbery squeezy chickens were produced. Next,
you want to take the insights gained in the first visualization and narrow down your analysis
to the top manufacturing plant in terms of revenue generation. You will then see if there is
any seasonality pattern for this specific manufacturing plant by looking at monthly sales.
Finally, you want to look at days of the week insights. Is there any particular day that sold the
most on average? Is there any particular day of the week that generated the highest revenue
on average?
In order to reach the desired visualizations, the following are the steps we will follow:
1. CONNECTING TO THE DATA (here)
• Connect to Teradata
• Connect to WCOB_RSC database
• Connect to the three tables: DATE_DIMENSION, SALES_FACT and
PLANT_DIMENSION.

2. PREPARING THE DATA (here)

• Use hide and filter tools to reach this list of attributes:
o Date Description (Table: DATE_DIMENSION)
o Month Of Year (Table: DATE_DIMENSION)
o Year Number (Table: DATE_DIMENSION)
o Quarter of Year (Table: DATE_DIMENSION)
o Day of Week (Table: DATE_DIMENSION)
o Plant City (Table: PLANT_DIMENSION)
o Plant State (Table: PLANT_DIMENSION)
o Plant Description (Table: PLANT_DIMENSION)
o Sale Amount (Table: SALES_FACT)
o Quantity Sold (Table: SALES_FACT)
o Unit Price (Table: SALES_FACT)
* For further understanding of the attributes listed above, please refer to the data dictionary
appended at the end of the document.

3. CREATE THE VISUALIZATIONS (here)

1. A side-by-side bar chart for the total quantity sold and sale amount per
manufacturing plant.
2. A trend line chart with monthly sale amounts for the top manufacturing plant.
3. A dashboard with two packed bubble charts with average quantity sold and
average sale amount per day of the week for the top manufacturing plant.

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Open Tableau Desktop and begin

This tutorial assumes that you have logged in to University of Arkansas VMWare
platform. Select the Start Windows icon, look for Tableau 2019.2 and click on it.
Wait 10 seconds until the application opens. If an update Tableau window pops
up, exit this window.
The first thing you see after you open Tableau Desktop is the start PAGE. Here, you select
the connection that you want to use - how you will connect to your data
The start page gives you
several options to choose
from:
a
a. Click the Tableau icon in b c e
the upper left-
hand corner of
any page to visit the start
page at any time.
b. Under Connect, you
can:
o Connect to data that is
stored in a file, such as
Microsoft Excel or
Access.
o Connect to data that is
stored on a server,
such as Tableau d
Server, Microsoft SQL
Server, or Google
Analytics.
o Connect to a data
source that you’ve
connected to before.
Tableau supports the ability to connect to a wide variety of data stored in a wide variety of
places. The Connect pane lists the most common places that you might want to connect
to, or click the More… link to see more options. More on connecting to data sources in
the Learning Library (in the top menu).
c. Under Open, you can open workbooks that you have already created.
d. Under Sample Workbooks, view sample dashboards and worksheets that come with
Tableau Desktop.
e. Under Discover, find additional resources like video tutorials, forums, or the “Viz of the
week” to get ideas about what you can build.

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Connect to Teradata
Under Connect > To a Server, select
More. A new window will open, click on
Teradata as shown in the figure
alongside.
A window will ask you to enter the
following information:
Server: 130.184.26.161
Username: given to you by instructor
Password: given to you by instructor

Connect to WCOB_RSC
Now we have to access the
WCOB_RSC database through the
panel to the left:
1. Type “WCOB_RSC”, click on the
search icon. A new “WCOB_RSC”
will appear below, click on it.
2. Once on the database, click
on the search icon.
3. Finally, tables from the
database should appear on
the panel to the left.
Your window should look like the picture
on the right. You are connected to
WCOB_RSC database (circled in red).
The left panel shows the tables (circled
in green) in the database.
At the bottom left corner, there are two
tabs named Data Source and Sheet 1.
Click on Sheet 1 and a window similar
to the picture below will appear.
Sheet 1 does not currently have data.
This is indicated by an exclamation point
next to the database name (circled in red
in the figure on the next page).
Click on the Data Source tab on the

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

bottom left. This will take you to the

previous window where you connected
to the Database and displayed the
tables.

Connect to Date_Dimension table

On the Data Source window:
4. Drag and drop the
Date_Dimension table on the left
panel to the blank space at the top
where is says “Drag tables here”.
5. Click on Update Now (circled in
green) and Tableau will fill the
columns with data.
6. Click on Sheet 1.
You will now note that you can see
the table attributes assigned to
Dimensions and Measures.

As a recap:
After you connect to your data, Tableau does the following:
• Opens a new worksheet. This is a blank slate where you create your first view.
• Automatically assigns data types (such as date, number, string, etc.) and roles
(dimension or measures) to your data. (We'll talk more about these terms later.)
• Adds columns from your data source to the Data pane on the left-hand side. Columns
are added as fields.
If you want to review details of your data, you can select the Data Source tab in the bottom
left-hand corner. Here, you can view the first 1,000 rows of your data. What happens in
Tableau stays in Tableau; the data is safe.
When you connect to your own data, you might need to do some prep work before connecting
to it in Tableau. This is because Tableau makes assumptions about your data so that it can
display it properly. With the Date_Dimension table added, we have the first five variables
needed for our analysis: Date Description, Month of Year, Year Number, Quarter of Year,
and Day of Week.
Note: If you navigated to Data Source to check out the details, just click on the tab for Sheet
1 to get back to where you started.

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Add the Sales_Fact table

To obtain the variables for the
remainder of the analysis, we need to
add and connect the
Date_Dimension table to the
Sales_Fact table. The connection is
possible since both tables share a
single variable attribute: Date Key.
7. Return to the Data Source page.
8. Drag and drop
Date_Dimension to the blank
space like you did with
Sales_FACT.
9. The two intersecting circles
(circled in green) mean that
they were successfully
connected. This is considered
an inner join.
10. Right click on the join symbol.
The popup shows all the
different joins Tableau allows
you to do. Here
Date_Dimension table is taken as ‘Data Source’ inner joining Sales_Fact table.
Both have Date Key as the common attribute joined by an equal sign (circled in red).
Now we have the attributes from both the Date_Dimension table and the Sales_Fact table.

Add the Plant_Dimension table

Finally, we need to add and connect the Plant_Dimension table. Similar to what we just
did, the connection will be with table Sales_Fact. This connection is possible since both
tables share the single variable attribute: Plant Key. Repeat the same steps as above:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Preparing the Data

Hide Unneeded Fields
To get the list of attributes stated in The Story,
we need to hide the ones we don’t need:
1. Click the down arrow at the top
right corner of each attribute not
needed in the analysis.
2. Click on Hide and the attribute will
no longer appear in the data.
To undo this, click the ‘Show hidden fields’ box
at the far right of the window and manually
unhide the attribute.
After hiding all the unnecessary attributes and keeping only the ones mentioned (Date
Description, Month of Year, Year Number, Quarter of Year, Day of Week, Plant City,
Plant State, Plant Description, Sale amount, Quantity Sold, and Unit Price) your
screen should look like the following:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Filter Fields
Since our analysis is based on the year 2017 only, we can already filter our data to that
year:

On the picture above, at the top right corner, you can find a Filters subtitle: Commented [RF1]: Need to correct the circled items.

3. Click on Add. A new window will open, click on Add.. again.

4. You are now in the ‘Add Filter’ window. Click on Year Number and then click OK.
5. Your ae now in the ‘Filter [Year Number]’ window. Click on Range of Values box
(highlighted in blue).
6. In the two blank spaces, type 2017 (this will set the range to the year 2017 only).
7. Click Ok.
Note: You are not required to filter the date at this moment. Alternatively, you can do this
when you are already working on a workbook.
We have finished organizing our data:
8. Click on Sheet 1, now you can start your visualizations.

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Create the Visualizations

Total Quantity Sold and Sale amount per Plant
Create the side-by-side bars chart for the total quantity sold and sale amount per
manufacturing plant.
The following are the parameters you wanted for the exploration of the quantity sold and
sales value in your side-by-side bar chart.
• Manufacturing plants in descending order.
• For the year 2017.
• Show the total quantity sold and total sale amount per plant.
• The side-by-side bar chart should be in US Dollars.
The parameters help set which dimensions and measures you are interested in using.
Tableau will assume certain things for you as you create your visualization.
1. Start by dragging and dropping the
dimensions of Plant Description to
the Rows cell and the Quantity Sold
and Sale Amount measure to
Columns cell.
Since we already set our data for the year
2017, we do not need to filter the date
anymore unless we would want to analyze
a different year.
Nevertheless, you can tell by sharp sign
(#) next to Month of Year, Quarter of
Year, and Year Number, that these are
not set to a Date & Time data type. To
change this, do the following:
2. Click on Month of Year and keeping
shift select Quarter of Year and
Year Number (highlighted in green).
3. Right-click and choose Change Data
Type (highlighted in blue).
4. Select Date & Time (highlighted in blye). Now your dimensions have changed from
Number datatype to Date & Time datatype.
You should now see two horizontal column charts, one for Quantity
Sold and the other for Sale Amount. Now, we want to join these two
and create a side-by-side bar chart:
5. On the top right corner, click on Show Me (figure alongside).
This panel is a quick guide that helps you create different
visualizations based on the attributes you have.
6. Select the box with a side-by-side bar figure (circled in red).

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

At this point, your visualization should look like the following:

Our main objective is half-way completed. Now we have to make it readable for our boss
and visual friendly for presentation purposes.
We will first change our y-axis to
Dollars:
7. Click on the left Value panel
(y-axis). When highlighted in
blue, right-click on it. A new
‘Axis’ pane will appear where
your attributes were located.
8. Select Numbers. Then click
on Currency (Custom) and
make sure the following
parameters are selected:
a. Decimal places: 0
b. Display Units:
Thousands (K)
c. Prefix/Suffix: $
d. Box checked for: Include thousands separators.
Since all plants hold ‘Manufacturing Plant’ next to the city were they are located, we will
edit the aliases of the columns and remove them from their names:
Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

9. Right-click on the Plant Description

name and select Edit Alias.
10. Remove Manufacturing Plant from
the ‘Name: ‘ and click Ok.
11. Repeat for all the columns.
Now, we want our bars to have labels:
12. Under the Marks palette, click on the Label box.
13. On it, check the Show mark labels box and change
the font to size 10 and bold.
14. Double-click on the Sheet 1 tab and change the
name to: Total Quantity sold and Sale amount per
Plant in 2017. (This will automatically change the
title or your visualization).
Finally, right click on different places of the side-by-side bar
chart and change the font in a way that it looks presentable
to your audience.
15. Finally, to view your final product, click on
Presentation Mode (F7) on the top tool bar (circled in
red).
Try to make your visualization look something similar to this:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Monthly Sale Amount for top Manufacturing plant

Create a trend line of monthly sale amounts for the top manufacturing plant in 2017 found
on the previous visualization.
The following are the parameters you want for the exploration of the sales value in your
trend line:
• For the year 2017.
• Sale amounts in a monthly base.
• Trend line with area highlighted below (Area chart visual).
• The sale values should be in US Dollars.
The parameters help set which dimensions and measures you are interested in using.
Tableau will assume certain things for you as you create your visualization.
1. At the bottom left and next to the title you assigned to the previous visualization,
click on New Worksheet.
In the previous visualization we found that the
manufacturing plant in Newton was the one with the
highest revenue in Dollars. For that reason, we will
first filter our data to this manufacturing plant only:
2. Drag and drop Plant Description to the
Filters palette located above the Marks
palette.
3. A ‘Filter [Plant Description]’ window will
appear. Check the box where you see
Newton (circled in red). Click Ok.
Now everything you do in the worksheet will be for the Newton manufacturing plant only.
4. Double-click on the dimension Month of Year and on the measure Sale amount
(Tableau will automatically assign them to columns and row respectively).
5. Since the data was already filtered in the Preparation stage for the year 2017 only,
there is no
need to filter
the Year
Number.
Your visualization
should look
something similar to
the figure alongside.
You can notice some
seasonality pattern
on two months:
o 3 - March
o 8 – August

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Now, we want to show the area below our line and the respective
values for each month:
6. Click on Show Me (top right corner) and select Area Chart
(circled in red).
7. Click on the Label box like you did previously and click on
Show mark label (adjust the font accordingly).
8. Adjust the y-axis to Dollars ($) like we did above.
Hint: In order to put Dollar signs
to your labels, drag and drop
Sale Amount to the Label box
and alter the text by inserting a
Dollar sign ($) before the sale
amount.
9. Click on the Color box in the Marks palette and under Effects, click on Border and
select the black color.
Finally, show the average sale amount for the year in Newton Manufacturing plant:
10. On the left panel, at the top left corner, click on Analytics (next to Data).
11. Drag Average Line to the trend line, a window
will appear.
12. Drop Average Line on the intersection between
the Table column and the Sum(Sale Amount)
row (circled in red).
Format the entire visualization like we did with the previous one and try to arrive to
something like the following:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Average Quantity Sold and Sale Amount per day of the

week
As the final task, we want to take a different look at Newton Manufacturing Plant. We are
interested at the average quantity sold and average sale amount per day of the week.
The following are the parameters you want for the exploration of the sales value in your
trend line:
• For the year 2017.
• Average quantity sold and sale amount per day of the week.
• The sale values should be in US Dollars.
• Values should be in packed bubbles.
The parameters help set which dimensions and measures you are interested in using.
Tableau will assume certain things for you as you create your visualization.
1. Create a new worksheet and name it: 2017 Average quantity sold and sale
amount per day of the week.
2. Filter to Newton manufacturing plant.
3. Double-click on dimension Day of Week.
4. Double click on measure Quantity Sold.
5. Right-click on SUM(Quantity Sold) under
the Marks palette. Click on Measure (Sum)
and select Average.
6. Under Show Me, select the packed bubbles box.
Your visualization should look similar to the following:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Now we want to adjust the format of our visualization:

7. Add labels in such a way that the average quantity sold value is displayed.
8. Adjust the size of your labels and make each bubble have a black border.
To adjust the visualization’s width before looking at it in the presentation mode:
9. Click on the drop-down menu
that says Standard and
change it to Entire View
(circled in red). This will
center your visualization.
10. Change the title to: 2017 Average quantity sold per day of the week
Your visualization should look similar to the following:

You notice that we changed the title to only quantity sold and the visualization only shows
quantity sold. We did this in purpose:
11. Right-click on the worksheet tab and select Duplicate.
You just duplicated your worksheet. On the duplicated one do
the following:
12. Change the title to: 2017 Average sale amount per
day of the week
13. Under Marks Palette, replace SUM(Quantity Sold)
measures for Sale Amount.
14. Modify the labels and make sure to show the Dollar sign ($) values.
Your visualization should look like the following:
Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Now you have two worksheets where one displays average quantity sold per day of the
week and the other average sale amount per day of the week. What we want to do now is
display both in the same visualization:
15. Next to the last worksheet tab created, click on
Create Dashboard (circled in red).
16. On the new Dashboard, on the left panel under Sheets, drag the two worksheets
(one after the other) and drop them in the blank space.
Your window should look like this:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

17. Click on the drop-down menu in the legend box

and click on Floating as shown in the figure
alongside.
18. Repeat step 17 but now click on Arrange
items and select Single row as shown in the
figure alongside.
19. Adjust the size of your new legend box until all
the Days of the week are visible in the
visualization.
20. Format the legend box at your own preference.
21. Go to presentation mode (F7).
The end result should display something similar to the
following:

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Data Dictionary
Batch_Product_Fact Table

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Product_Fact Table

Month_Dimension

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Inventory_Fact Table

Sales_Fact Table

Date_Dimension Table

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Product_Dimension Table

Customer_Dimension Table

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Department_Dimension Table

Movement_Dimension Table

Shift_Dimension Table

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018
WCOB_SAMS_INTEGRATED Data Connection

Plant_Dimension Table

Updated by Matias Delay – Sept 2019 Created by Ron Freeze – June 2018