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Tableau | Data prep | Tool strategy

Data quality indicators

Tableau 2020.3 brings data quality warnings into Desktop, but you'll still need to jump to the server to read the details.

Tim Ngwena •12 August 2020 •1 min read •4 min watch •4.2K

Watch on YouTube

Data quality warnings require the Data Management add-on enabled on your Tableau Server, which carries an additional cost.
Warnings created on Tableau Server or Online now appear in Tableau Desktop when you connect to the same data source.
The Desktop warning icon doesn't display the full warning text in the tooltip, so you still have to go to the server to read the details.
Different warning types (deprecated, under maintenance, stale, sensitive) plus a high-visibility setting control how the icon appears.
Desktop won't show updated warnings until you close and reopen, or disconnect and reconnect, as the metadata only refreshes when re-adding the data source.

0:00Hello, it's Tim here and in 2020.3 Tableau

0:05have added the ability to see data quality

0:07warnings in Tableau Desktop. Now one of the

0:10requirements to actually see and use this

0:12feature is that you have the data

0:14management add-on enabled on your Tableau

0:17server and

0:17once that's enabled you actually get the

0:20data quality warnings as part of that add-

0:22on. So

0:22there is a little bit of an additional cost

0:25to have this feature. What you can see here

0:27is I've actually got four datasets and one

0:29of them has a data quality warning. I

0:31actually

0:31added this back in 2020.2 and it has a

0:34simple warning on Superstore sales and I've

0:37basically

0:37put a simple warning here to say it's not

0:39accurate, needs validation by DB admin. If

0:43you want to check out how to create these

0:44data quality warnings check out one of my

0:46other videos that will be popping up here

0:48on the screen just right now. Now what I

0:51want

0:51to do is to be able to see this in Tableau

0:53Desktop when I connect. So I'm going to

0:55open

0:55up Tableau Desktop here and I'm going to go

0:57ahead and connect to the exact same Tableau

0:59server. Now I'm actually already logged in

1:02so I didn't need to log in here during this

1:04demo but you can see here that I get the

1:06data quality warning as it is in Tableau

1:09Server.

1:09Now if I click this little icon I actually

1:11get the same warning as I got on Tableau

1:13Online

1:13slash Tableau Server and so you can see

1:15that this feature is working here in

1:17Desktop. I'm

1:18going to go ahead and actually connect to

1:20this data source and the final thing here

1:22is that we should also see this warning

1:25over here in Tableau Desktop itself. It

1:27doesn't

1:27specify the warning there. I wish that

1:29tooltip that we saw on the screen before

1:31was actually

1:31brought here. That would be a much, much

1:33nicer feature but it does tell you to go to

1:35Tableau

1:36Server to understand what kind of warnings

1:38are being applied to this data source. Now

1:40what I want to do is I want to just go back

1:43on here to this view and I'm actually going

1:46to go ahead and try and change this data

1:48quality warning. So I'm going to click on

1:50this data

1:51set. I'm going to hit these three dots and

1:54if I go to quality warning I can actually

1:56remove the warning. So let's say I'm going

1:59to say that this has been deprecated. Hit

2:01save. I think this actually enables a

2:03different icon. It enables the same color

2:06icon. I actually

2:07want to do is change this. There is

2:09actually a slightly different iconology. I

2:12think under

2:12maintenance might be another one with a

2:15slightly different icon altogether. Under

2:17maintenance

2:18uses this one as well. So let me keep going

2:20here until I find one that's got a meaning

2:23fully

2:23different icon. Sensitive data. Okay, maybe

2:28I'm imagining things. I could swear these

2:31icons were slightly different. Maybe stale

2:36might be the last one. I guess warning and

2:38deprecated we've already tried. It's not

2:41sensitive so let me disable that high

2:44quality, high

2:45visibility data warning. Sorry and here we

2:48go. So okay this is a I think what I was

2:50doing

2:51wrong there is I was actually trying to

2:53change the icon when it's actually this

2:55high visibility

2:56setting here. So you can see this data

2:58quality warning has changed. So now if I go

3:00back to

3:01Tableau Desktop and just do a little

3:03refresh of the data source you'll see that

3:06it doesn't

3:07nothing changes. So what I need to do is

3:10actually close the desktop edition and open

3:13it again

3:13or I can reconnect to the same data source.

3:16If I go here to the Tableau server you can

3:18see it now pulls the fresh information

3:20about the data sources. You can now see it

3:22's correct.

3:23Connect to that and then once it's inside

3:26of desktop you should see that they now

3:28both

3:29update. Essentially what's happening there

3:31is the metadata about the data source isn't

3:33coming through until I add it onto the view

3:35again. It's not just sort of quickly

3:37refreshing

3:37there. So if you close and open again that

3:39should work or if you disconnect and

3:41reconnect

3:41again that should work. Go ahead and close

3:44this duplicate now and now you can see the

3:46data quality warning has changed and it's

3:48available here for us to see in desktop.

3:51That's

3:51pretty much the feature in a nutshell. If

3:53you enjoyed the video check out other

3:55videos

3:55on this channel especially about the 2020.3

3:58release. Otherwise if not drop us a comment

4:00below and let us know what kind of content

4:01you'd like to see in the future. Thanks for

Rollup

Tableau 2020.3 surfaces server-created data quality warnings inside Desktop, but the warning text isn't fully shown there and Desktop won't pick up server-side changes until you reconnect.

A published data source on Tableau Server had a data quality warning set up (e.g. flagging it as needing validation). The demo connects to that same data source from Tableau Desktop to see how the warning appears and updates.

The Breakdown

Requires Data Management add-on 0:00

To see or set data quality warnings at all, your Tableau Server needs the Data Management add-on enabled, which comes at an additional cost. Without it, this feature isn't available.
Warning icon appears in Desktop 0:49

Once connected to a data source that has a warning set on Server, you'll see the same warning icon appear in Tableau Desktop, both at the point of connecting and on the data source in your workbook.
Tooltip doesn't show full detail 1:21

Clicking the icon in Desktop doesn't reproduce the full warning text you'd see on Server — it just tells you to go check Tableau Server for the details, so you still need server access to read the actual message.
Warning types and icons on the server 1:41

On the server, you can set a warning type — such as deprecated, under maintenance, sensitive data, or stale — and toggle a high-visibility setting. It's the visibility setting, not the warning type, that changes how prominent the icon looks; several of the type icons look near-identical.
Desktop won't auto-refresh the warning 3:01

After changing a warning on the server, a normal data refresh in Desktop does not pull the update through — the metadata about warnings only loads when the data source is added to the view.
Force the update by reconnecting 3:21

To see an updated warning, close and reopen Tableau Desktop, or disconnect and reconnect to the data source; either forces Desktop to re-fetch the data source metadata, including the current warning.

Worth Knowing

The feature depends on the paid Data Management add-on being enabled on your server — it isn't a default Desktop capability.
Desktop shows that a warning exists but not its full text, so reading the actual message still means visiting Tableau Server.
Some warning-type icons look very similar to each other; the more noticeable visual change comes from the high-visibility toggle, not the type itself.
A simple refresh isn't enough to see a changed warning in Desktop — you need to re-add or reconnect the data source.

Use It When

Useful when you're governing shared data sources and want analysts to get a heads-up about data issues without leaving Desktop, though you'll still need to point them to Server for the full warning text.

How this Rollup was made provenance & method

A Rollup is drafted by AI from the video's transcript, then reviewed and edited by Tim. Everything used to produce this one is listed below — the model, the exact prompt, and the source video — so the process is transparent and reproducible.

Transcription: On-device — NVIDIA Parakeet v3 for recent videos, OpenAI Whisper large-v3 for earlier ones. The transcript never leaves the machine or gets published.
Drafting: Claude Sonnet 5 in the cloud, from that transcript.
Prompt: The exact Rollup prompt (v2) — the full system prompt, unedited.
Source video: Watch on YouTube
Drafted: 5 July 2026 at 09:38
Reviewed & edited: 5 July 2026 at 09:41 · by Tim Ngwena

Model + prompt + video is everything you'd need to recreate a Rollup like this yourself. The one thing we don't share is the transcript.

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