0:00Images are a right pain to work with inside
0:02a Tableau.
0:02Let's just be honest.
0:03Yes, you can drop them into a dashboard.
0:05Yes, you can use them as backgrounds.
0:07Yes, you can use them as shapes, but that's
0:09just also wrong.
0:10What I want to show you today is a tool
0:12that actually handles
0:13images correctly and can work very nicely
0:16with Tableau.
0:17I'm going to blow your mind with a tool
0:18called Cloudinary.
0:19Let's get stuck in.
0:20Now, just to set this up, I'm actually
0:22going to be using a mock data set in Excel.
0:24I think Excel is actually a fair example
0:26here, because not everyone has databases.
0:28Not everyone uses Tableau that way.
0:30And I'm going to show you a method that
0:31would work well in partnership with a
0:33database where the information is held.
0:35So here I have a file with 10 names and
0:38first names.
0:39And on another tab here, I have some URLs.
0:42Now these URLs are essentially image links
0:45to a service called Cloudinary,
0:46which I'll show you very, very soon.
0:48What I've done is I've then dropped this
0:49inside of Tableau.
0:50I'm not going to go through that whole
0:51process.
0:52You know how to do that.
0:53If you don't know how to do that, check out
0:54tons of videos on YouTube, but I've
0:56essentially dropped into Tableau and I've
0:58gone into the data source and I've set up
1:00a data model.
1:01Now, lots of people would suggest joining.
1:03If you've never used the data model, if you
1:06just still join objects by joining, I'm
1:07talking about doing this, opening up this
1:10connection and doing a left join on the ID
1:12field, which Tableau will actually figure
1:14out for you because it's smart enough that
1:15way.
1:16If this is what you're doing today and you
1:17've never tried the data model, just stop
1:19doing this.
1:20This is, this is sort of, this is such an
1:22old way of doing things and honest to God,
1:24you will honestly love the data model once
1:26you get familiar with it.
1:27So instead, create a relationship.
1:28It works exactly the same way and more
1:30often than not, Tableau will actually do
1:32the
1:32right thing for you and it takes a whole
1:34load of pain away.
1:35You can see that the relationships are set
1:36up down here on the bottom left and it
1:38works exactly as you'd expect.
1:40Now, the real power with the data model is
1:42that Tableau only brings the data
1:45together at the query level.
1:46So when you're actually looking at a sheet
1:48of information, Tableau evaluates the sheet
1:50and figures out what data it needs from the
1:52second data source and then process the
1:54relationships with a join or with any other
1:57sort of way of using Tableau, whether it's
1:59blends, unions, Tableau has to do that
2:01ahead of time.
2:01So it's actually more computationally
2:03intensive.
2:04So enough of a sidetrack on data model.
2:06Here we are.
2:07We have the images set up on the dashboard.
2:09Now I've done another thing, which is I've
2:12broken down the URL into its sub component.
2:15Now the reason I've done that is because
2:16when I went into Cloudinary and I got my
2:18URLs, I did it manually.
2:19Yes, you wouldn't do this manually
2:21typically, but then I needed to recreate
2:23what you'd
2:23actually get out of the system if you're
2:25using something like an API.
2:26So that's what you see over here on the
2:28right hand side.
2:29You essentially have the base URL and what
2:31you can do is you can add a part of the URL
2:33in front of it.
2:34You can see this particular text is pretty
2:36much the same across all of the links.
2:39So that's just added to the front of the
2:41URL and that makes the whole URL.
2:42So it's essentially two parts, the file URL
2:45and then the base URL for the service.
2:48And that pretty much makes the whole URL.
2:49But this is where this service gets very
2:51interesting.
2:52Before I show you this amazing, I really do
2:54promise you this will blow your mind.
2:56Let's go to the next dashboard where I'll
2:58show you what I've set up.
3:00So here you can see I've set up a very
3:01simple dashboard and what I've done is I've
3:04set up a dashboard action.
3:05Now, if you don't know how to do that, just
3:07go over here to the top, select actions,
3:09and
3:09it opens up this interface.
3:10Depending on your version of Tableau, this
3:12might look slightly different.
3:13If it looks like this, you're using a newer
3:15version of Tableau and it's going to look
3:16exactly the same as mine.
3:17If you're using an older version, the
3:19options are the same.
3:20You just need to look for where they are.
3:21In essence, you need to add an action and
3:24essentially need to add a go to URL action.
3:26In a recent version of Tableau, they
3:28changed this URL action so it could
3:30actually affect
3:31a web object.
3:32So you can see here that I've called this
3:34URL action image.
3:35It's from my dashboard, dashboard number
3:36one.
3:37It's from sheet number one.
3:38And when I click on any item in that
3:40particular sheet, it's essentially passing
3:43this web
3:44object to this particular box.
3:47So you can see this box is called res.cloud
3:49inary.com because it's actually been
3:50activated.
3:51But when I set this up, I just set this up
3:52to Google.
3:53So let me show you what that looks like.
3:54Let's just go hit cancel, cancel, and let's
3:57just reset this URL so you can see
3:59something
3:59more neutral.
4:00So let's just go ahead and delete that.
4:02And I'll just say, hey, TPS, let's go to
4:05google.com.
4:06I'm looking around my mic if you're
4:07wondering what I'm doing.
4:08Hit OK, and you'll see it just loads up
4:10Google.
4:11When I go back to my dashboard action,
4:13select actions, go into this particular
4:16action and
4:17edit it, you'll see that it now says Google
4:18.
4:18So that web object just points to whatever
4:20URL is currently in that web object.
4:22And you'll see that what I have the option
4:26to do is to essentially pass it a URL from
4:30the
4:30sheet.
4:30And the way that's set up is actually
4:32through this insert option just over here
4:34on the right
4:35hand side.
4:35Let's go ahead and click that.
4:36You'll see you get three things, a URL, the
4:38link, and the name.
4:40It's essentially looking for the text
4:42fields inside of Tableau itself.
4:43So these are essentially coming from the
4:46data source that it can see in the view.
4:48Now, these are essentially this name, link,
4:50and URL.
4:51These are the three fields that you can see
4:53here, and it's just passing that in there.
4:55So if I give it the full link, that's
4:56essentially just going to give it the full
4:59URL for the
4:59image.
5:00And when I hit OK, and I hit OK again, now
5:02when I click on any particular line here,
5:05it's
5:05going to change this box to use that image.
5:07So let's go ahead and click that.
5:09And you can see, oh, there's an HTTP error
5:11that broke.
5:11Let's go ahead and actually double check
5:13that action.
5:14I can swear I broke that during the setup.
5:17Let's just go double check that.
5:18And you can see, hey, HTTPS res.cloudinary.
5:21com.
5:22Oh, that's why, because I set two links in
5:24there.
5:24I broke it because I was doing the demo.
5:26So I'm sure I did something wrong there.
5:28Let's try again.
5:29There we go.
5:30Now the image is loaded.
5:31Now, the problem is, is these images
5:32actually quite large.
5:33Let me show you where I've uploaded the
5:35images.
5:36If I switch tabs to this tab, you can see
5:38that I've got a nice square image.
5:40And you're probably wondering, hey, how is
5:41that square when the images we saw in the
5:43previous dashboard were all sorts of
5:45proportions?
5:45Well, what I've done is I've uploaded it to
5:47this service called Cloudinary.
5:49Now, Cloudinary is a cloud service.
5:51It's pretty much like a platform for images
5:53.
5:53Just think of it as like an API for images.
5:55And this is my console.
5:57If I just go to the cloudinary.com website,
6:00let's just see their homepage so you can
6:02see
6:02what they're about.
6:03They're essentially about the unleashing
6:05the potential of your digital media.
6:06Essentially, you can upload things like
6:08images and video to their service, but then
6:10you can
6:11almost program how those images work just
6:13by changing parameters in a URL or in your
6:16API or by the way you call the images.
6:18Essentially, they take the heavy work of
6:20processing the images for you so you don't
6:23have
6:23to ahead of time.
6:24So you can upload professionally taken
6:26images.
6:26They could be whatever size.
6:27And then this service will do things like
6:30transform them for you and change them on
6:32request and obviously cache them if it's
6:34done it once before.
6:35But it will do it on request.
6:37You don't have to do all this heavy work
6:38ahead of time, especially when you've got
6:40large
6:40images, some of which may never get used.
6:42This service does it all for you.
6:43And so I go to my console.
6:45You'll see that I've got a list of images.
6:48Now, where this feature is so, so cool is
6:50if I click on any one of these images, let
6:53's go
6:53ahead and go.
6:55Let's just actually click on it.
6:56You'll see that we have loads of preview of
6:58what the images look like.
6:59Okay. And what this service can do is if
7:01you look at the bottom here, you've got
7:04something
7:04called transformations.
7:05Now, these transformations essentially
7:08allow you to change the image on demand by
7:10just
7:10changing the URL.
7:11So what I want you to look at is this
7:13particular part of the URL when I click
7:16something else.
7:17So let's say I want this as a circle.
7:19I can just go ahead, click on a circle, and
7:21you'll see that it adds a parameter to the
7:24website just over here.
7:26It processes it.
7:27And once it processes it, it's cached.
7:29So next time I come to render this image,
7:31it'll be really, really fast.
7:32Let's go to a thumbnail instead.
7:34Let's go to this thumbnail over here.
7:36And again, you can see that it's been set
7:38to a width of 200.
7:39Now, because the image is really, really
7:41tall, it's obviously going to be a tall
7:43image.
7:43It's probably four or five hundred pixels
7:45large.
7:46But I could set a height for that as well
7:47if I wanted to.
7:48I can just go ahead and type that in and it
7:50will change that comfortably.
7:52And so what this allows us to do is inside
7:55of our dashboard, we can dynamically change
7:58the
7:58image just using a calculation.
8:00You could use a parameter.
8:01You could use device specific URLs, for
8:04example.
8:04Let's say on a mobile dashboard, you have a
8:06much, much smaller images.
8:08On another dashboard, you have much larger
8:10images.
8:10The only stipulation, the only challenge
8:12here is that you need to load it into Web
8:14Object in
8:14today's version of Tableau.
8:16And in the future, when image rolls come,
8:18you'll be able to build dynamic URLs that
8:21meet
8:21those image roles and change depending on
8:22where they're being used inside of the
8:24dashboard,
8:25which is an absolute sort of brain teaser
8:27of a feature.
8:28So let's go ahead and show you how that
8:29could actually work.
8:30So at the moment, I have this I have this
8:32container here that's set to 300 pixels by
8:35300
8:36pixels. What I want to do is go ahead and
8:38change one of these images to match those
8:41proportions. You can see this one of the
8:42airplane doesn't match it at all.
8:44I can't even remember which one I click.
8:45Let's just click through these until we
8:47find that one with the plane.
8:48In fact, they're all down fit the
8:49proportions.
8:50There we go.
8:50That's I can't even pronounce the surname.
8:53This is from a mock data set.
8:54And obviously it's gone and found names
8:56that I can't pronounce standard.
8:57But let me just go and change the
8:59parameters of this.
9:00And I'm going to do this inside a tableau.
9:02I'm not going to go to Cloud Marine.
9:03I could do it there and show you, but I'll
9:05do it here inside of Tableau just by
9:07changing a
9:07calculation. So let's go back to sheet one
9:10where we have this.
9:12And this is the actual image that we're
9:14going to be looking at.
9:16What I will do, though, is I'll keep
9:17everything else so we can see the sort of
9:20calculations working.
9:21And remember, this is my base URL.
9:22So what I'm going to do is I'm just going
9:24to type the calculation first so you can
9:26see this
9:27working in honest and then we can start
9:28doing some more clever stuff.
9:30In fact, I probably won't do the clever
9:31stuff.
9:32I just should have explained how that works
9:34using parameters or some other items.
9:35So I'm just going to cheat here and edit
9:37the alias.
9:38The reason I'm doing that so I can get the
9:40actual text and I can copy inside of a
9:42calculation. So let's go ahead and create a
9:44new calculation.
9:46And what we'll do is we'll call this 300
9:49pixels by 300 pixels.
9:50OK, so 300 by 300.
9:53OK, and of course, the end of the URL has
9:56already been done for us.
9:59I've got that over here. So I already did a
10:01calculation ahead of time.
10:02The way I did that calculation for anyone
10:04who's curious is I essentially staged it in
10:07three parts. Look at me. I even documented
10:08this ahead of time because I'm organized.
10:10That never happens. So what we have is a
10:12three step calculation.
10:15Step one, find the position of the text
10:17upload because that is consistent across
10:19URLs.
10:19Step two, find the length of the entire
10:22text string and then subtract the number of
10:25characters that would comprise the word
10:27upload.
10:28Now, those who view who are keen will know
10:30the upload is actually six characters.
10:32But the way the computer works actually
10:34starts at zero.
10:35So it will find six, but that will actually
10:38be five.
10:38So I need to minus five to essentially find
10:41the correct position for the entire length
10:44of the text.
10:45Now, step three is we basically do some
10:47math between those to find out the position
10:50from
10:50the right hand side that I need to capture
10:52the URL.
10:53And that's what you can see here for the
10:54URL, essentially really super simple.
10:56So I've explained that. Now let's go ahead
10:58and create our own calculations and right
11:00click on that URL for to create calculated
11:02field.
11:03And we're just going to make this larger so
11:05you can see I'm just hitting command equals
11:07on a Mac, which is plus.
11:08And what I'll do is I'll essentially grab
11:11the base URL.
11:12I'll just paste it in. It's a bit long and
11:14messy, but that's exactly what we need.
11:16And we're going to delete everything up
11:18until the forward slash here, OK, because
11:20that's
11:20what we're going to add later on.
11:21And what we'll do is we'll add a speech
11:23marks around this to tell Tableau that this
11:26is
11:26actually a string and we'll go ahead and
11:29finish that.
11:30OK, so there we go. We've added that.
11:31And now we're pretty much good to go.
11:33We could just leave it here and it would
11:34load the image.
11:35But what I actually need to do is add some
11:37parameters.
11:37So the thing I'm going to add is I'm going
11:40to add another I added that in the wrong
11:42place.
11:42I'm going to add another plus because we
11:44essentially need to add a piece of text in
11:46between these two. And let's just go ahead
11:48and do that.
11:49So we've got somewhere to add some text in.
11:52And what I'm going to do here is add
11:54specific parameter from Cladero.
11:56Now I'm going back to Cladero just to grab
11:58some parameters.
11:59You can see that I've actually done this
12:01already once here.
12:02I set this particular thumbnail to 400 by
12:04400.
12:05So just to show you how this works really,
12:07really quickly, I can just set this top
12:09parameter here to three.
12:10And so that's a three and then enter and it
12:13will go ahead and resize that image.
12:15So what I need is just this small bit of
12:18text.
12:18Copy it. Go back to Tableau.
12:23Put this in. And I want to make sure I don
12:25't have any spaces because that will
12:27essentially break the URL.
12:29So what this text does is it will give each
12:33URL a 300 by 300 sized image instead of the
12:38one that we have in there by default, which
12:40will make it square.
12:40And then it will fit perfectly into a Web
12:42object or whatever space that we have.
12:44So let's go ahead and hit apply.
12:46And now we have our 300 by 300 image.
12:49What I will do is I'll replace the link
12:51with that particular image so you can see
12:53that that's working.
12:55And let's just open up the link so you can
12:57see that, look, it now has that terminology
13:00all the way through all the URLs.
13:02So now I've just dynamically changed the
13:04size of all the images just by changing the
13:06parameter using a calculation.
13:07So let's go ahead to my dashboard.
13:09And what I will now need to do is go ahead
13:11and change my actions.
13:12So you'll actually get to see how I've set
13:14up this action in the first instance.
13:15Let's go ahead and hit edit.
13:17And what we want to do again is we go from
13:19sheet one to the Web object.
13:22It's already got something in there.
13:23And what I want to insert instead of the
13:25link, I actually want to insert my 300 by
13:28300 URL.
13:29You can see it actually loads up an item
13:31there.
13:31I can hit OK and I can hit OK.
13:33So this is the moment of truth.
13:34We should get a perfectly square image in
13:37this box.
13:37Let's go ahead and hit that.
13:38Oh, and we had an error.
13:40I think I probably did the same thing as
13:42last time.
13:42Let's just go ahead and double check that.
13:45So 300 by 300.
13:48Let's go ahead and click this and see if it
13:49actually loads something outside.
13:52It didn't load something outside, which
13:53means I probably did something wrong.
13:55Yes, I didn't include the text that says
13:57upload.
13:58That's a critical part of the component.
14:00So it's good to sort of troubleshoot these
14:01things.
14:02So what I will do is I will go and edit the
14:05calculation itself.
14:07So in this 300 by 300, there's a critical
14:11part of the URL that I forgot to add that
14:13adds the upload folder, essentially where I
14:15've put the image.
14:15So what I need to do here is just type
14:17upload.
14:19The reason this is, is because I removed it
14:21when I was finding the position of the text
14:23.
14:23Essentially, I used the term upload to find
14:25it and I removed it and I didn't put it
14:26back into the URL.
14:28So now that I've done that, we should be
14:29all gravy.
14:30You can see it's a little bit longer now.
14:32Let's go back to the dashboard.
14:33And now if we just go ahead and click that,
14:35we get a perfect square image and it loads
14:38and fills the space.
14:39So look at that.
14:40I haven't had to go to a design team and
14:41ask them to load me squares.
14:43I haven't had to go and do anything.
14:44It's all been done here in the image.
14:47Now, the great thing is that cloud really
14:49doesn't stop there.
14:49Cloud is just an incredibly useful tool.
14:51We can add lots of things.
14:53We can add text overlays on top of these.
14:55We can add watermarks onto these images.
14:57Let's say you're in an embedded solution.
15:00You want to add watermarks to images in a
15:01dashboard because for whatever reason, you
15:03want to let people know that these images
15:04are trademarked.
15:05You can do that all by just changing the
15:07URLs and it dynamically goes and adds that.
15:10Now, the way the service does that, if I
15:11just close this tab, I can go to something
15:13called transformations and you can actually
15:15see what it can do.
15:16You can resize images to fill specific
15:17dimensions.
15:18This is what we've been doing.
15:19We can apply a constant scale.
15:21We can even do face detection.
15:22If you've got an image of people's faces
15:24when it crops, it will actually go and
15:26center the crop on the face.
15:27That's just unreal.
15:29You can even do data privacy capabilities.
15:32You can put an image over people's faces.
15:34So if you've got a photo and you want to
15:36make sure that some people don't see
15:38certain faces, then you can, of course, go
15:40ahead and use the service to go and find
15:41those faces.
15:42And you can add other sort of interesting
15:44aspects of images.
15:45And it even works with video.
15:46You can add things like borders.
15:47It really is quite a robust capability.
15:50I can't think of many things that won't
15:52work with this.
15:52Now, the really great thing here, if you
15:55work in consumer goods, it's even got a
15:57background changing capability.
16:00So you can actually go and isolate the
16:01background, remove the background and leave
16:03you with the objects.
16:05If you've got an image of something that's
16:06been taken on a sort of very average
16:08background, this can really help you apply
16:10some consistency to the way the images are
16:12done.
16:13And you can apply effects and styles that
16:15you can really change up what you're trying
16:17to do.
16:17Almost to a ridiculous extent.
16:19I wouldn't go as far as some of these sort
16:21of image suggestions work.
16:23I would probably just bake it into whatever
16:25service I'm using rather than trying to do
16:27all of this stuff in post.
16:28But here you are.
16:29You can just change the URL and change the
16:31way things work.
16:32And you're just defining it by adding a
16:34bunch of text parameters to the URL.
16:36So I just wanted to show that because when
16:38tablet implement the image role, I think
16:39this will be a really, really powerful
16:41service.
16:42Now, you're probably wondering, what does
16:43it cost?
16:44Okay, yeah, okay, you got me there.
16:45Let's go to my dashboard.
16:47And I'll show you sort of my cost.
16:49Now, the only way I can think of do this is
16:51actually just go to my account, because I
16:53think that's the only place where I can
16:54actually see how many credits I've used and
16:56what the limits are.
16:57So here we go.
16:58I have a free plan with 25 monthly credits.
17:00One credit equals 1000 transformations.
17:03So in essence, I get 25,000 transformations
17:06.
17:06And that credit also applies to storage.
17:09And I've barely used the storage.
17:10So if we're just using a small company
17:12dashboard, in all honesty, people in
17:15businesses don't actually go to dashboards
17:17that often we all know that if we feel
17:19server admins.
17:20And so you could actually get away with one
17:22use case, setting up a cloudinary account,
17:25uploading images.
17:26And if it's just a tactical deployment, you
17:28just want to test something really quickly,
17:29you could probably get away with just using
17:31the free limit.
17:32But actually, if you're in a large
17:33organization, you know, thousands of people
17:35are going to use a dashboard, maybe you're
17:37in an in an embedded solution.
17:39This is a really elegant way of scaling up
17:41the image capabilities in desktop, without
17:43having to go and build a whole image
17:44service behind it.
17:46All you need to do is work with the cloud
17:48inary API has an API and a platform behind
17:50it.
17:50You can essentially create the assets ahead
17:53of time.
17:53So upload all the assets, leave them in
17:55there.
17:56And when you're sort of done, you can do
17:58exactly what I did, you can just come and
18:00export a file with a URL, essentially, like
18:02I've done here, where we have the ID, the
18:04name, the link.
18:06And then with those things, you can
18:07essentially modify them all in the
18:09dashboard just to keep things flexible.
18:11Those images are also usable in other
18:13places.
18:13So cloudinary isn't just a tablet specific
18:15thing here.
18:16The way the API works.
18:18In fact, if you look at some of the
18:19examples that I was sharing earlier on, let
18:21's just go back a few steps.
18:22You can see they often show you ways of
18:24doing the same thing using different
18:26languages.
18:27So URLs is what I like in tablet is that's
18:29what I can edit text.
18:31But if you're using other tools and
18:33technologies like Ruby, pretty much all of
18:35these right the way through to app
18:36development, you can essentially have one
18:39consistent image library that works across
18:41a bunch of tools and tablet can just slot
18:43into that setup.
18:44So I think cloudinary is going to be an
18:46amazing tool for tableau.
18:48I really like to thank Andre Andre, my
18:49colleague and friend who introduced me to
18:51this service now nearly two, three years
18:53ago.
18:54Initially, I used to use this to run the
18:56images on my blog.
18:57Essentially, I'd upload the images here and
18:59I'd have the text statically hosted
19:01somewhere else.
19:02I think it was on them.
19:03I forget the name of the service.
19:04We can talk about that some other time.
19:06But in essence, I used to use this for
19:08hosting images on a blog.
19:09And actually, I realized this would be
19:11quite handy inside a tablet when I came
19:12across a business challenge this week.
19:14And hopefully this video show me how you
19:16two can do that.
19:17I'd love to know the creative ways that
19:18people are sort of implementing this.
19:20So if you do find this video useful, let me
19:21know in the comments what you've used it
19:23for, if you're going to use it, if you
19:24found it useful.
19:25You've got any tweaks or suggestions.
19:27I actually think Tableau should really
19:28think about images properly because we all
19:31want to bring a lot of design elements into
19:33our dashboards as authors.
19:34But actually, it's an incredibly tough
19:36thing to do.
19:37At the moment, we've got very sort of
19:38narrow places where we can work with images
19:40.
19:40And I think for now, at least, this image
19:43service will help you work with Web objects
19:45.
19:46But in the future, when the image rolls
19:47will roll out, this service will become
19:49really, really handy for just making sure
19:51your dashboards always lays images that are
19:53nicely formatted and are consistent.
19:55Thanks for watching.
19:56and I'll catch you in the next video.
19:58[BLANK_AUDIO]
Tableau | Data visualisation | Tool strategy