0:00Hey, it's Tim here. In today's video I'm
0:01covering the new Workbook Optimizer in
0:04Tableau 22.1.
0:06Let's just get straight into it and let me
0:08show you how this works.
0:09When you go to publish a workbook, if I
0:11just go to server up here and hit publish,
0:14you'll see that the usual publish interface
0:16will pop up. But at the very bottom, if I
0:18just sort of
0:19highlight the space here, there's a new
0:21option which is called the Workbook Optim
0:23izer. When you
0:24go ahead and click on that, it brings up
0:26this pop-up. And this pop-up is I think a
0:28really, really
0:29nice step. For a long time when people have
0:31been building workbooks, there's been a lot
0:34of sort of
0:34best practice that sometimes goes as
0:37folklore. People will say, "Oh, don't build
0:39too many tables,
0:40don't do too much of that, don't do too
0:42much of this. Oh, don't use fix, don't use
0:45expanding
0:45dashboards." All of these things are just
0:47little tips and tricks that you pick up
0:49while talking
0:50to people. But what Tableau have done here
0:52is they've codified it into a best practice
0:54optimizer. And the optimizer doesn't change
0:57your workbook, but it gives you guidance on
0:59how you can improve it and how you can make
1:01things better in the actual workbook.
1:03And so if you look at this screen, there's
1:04a couple of elements. Let's just break this
1:06down
1:06a little bit. You've got the number of
1:08tests that Tableau has run on the top right
1:10-hand side. So
1:12it has passed 10 out of 12 tests. The two
1:15that it's failed are here in red and amber.
1:17Now,
1:18typically Tableau doesn't use red, amber,
1:20green. So I wonder if that's just a styl
1:22istic thing for
1:23this particular feature. Everywhere else in
1:25the product, they use the blue and orange
1:27sort of
1:27moniker. But nonetheless here, it kind of
1:29makes sense. It kind of is like a traffic
1:31lock system,
1:32but for those who are color blind or who
1:34are visually impaired, this might be a
1:35little bit
1:36tricky. So maybe one for the feedback for
1:38the future. Now, if we expand each and
1:40every one of
1:40these, you do actually get an explanation.
1:43So if we start at the top, the one in red,
1:45multiple data sources have unused fields.
1:47Now this is actually quite a good one
1:49because when you
1:50publish workbooks to production databases,
1:53you're supposed to take out any fields that
1:55are unused
1:55because essentially when the workbook loads
1:57, it's going to load those fields, even
1:59though they're
1:59not being used. So it does take up a little
2:01bit of compute time that's unnecessary. So
2:03here, you're
2:04being told what those fields are. You've
2:06got the sales target and you've got the
2:08Superstore sales.
2:10You've actually got these fields here. So
2:12these fields and that field there are not
2:14being used in
2:15the entire workbook. So it's saying, hey,
2:17just remove these from the extract or just
2:19mark them
2:19as unused fields and hide them. And then
2:21Tableau won't even bother looking at them.
2:23So that's a
2:23really, really nice thing. And then the
2:26final step is they've added a little link,
2:28which takes you
2:29off to some supporting guidance. So if you
2:30go and click on that, we actually get taken
2:32to a page.
2:33And at the moment, these aren't working. I
2:35'm recording this video just a little bit
2:37ahead
2:37of the release just to get ahead of it. But
2:39nonetheless, when you do go to the link, it
2:40will
2:41actually show you the support guidance on
2:43that feature. So I know Tableau is working
2:45to build
2:45some of these guides because they are very
2:47specific to this optimizer to kind of give
2:49it all
2:49some context in one nice place. But
2:51nonetheless, this is here. I think this is
2:53fantastic.
2:54So it's a really sort of nicely broken down
2:56thing. Here's something that's going wrong.
2:58Here's how you can improve it. And here's
3:00why it helps. Super clear. You don't have
3:03to be an expert
3:04anymore to know how to optimize a workbook.
3:06That is a huge win for lots of companies
3:09who are
3:09building workbooks, and it's going to make
3:11a lot of life easier. Now, if we dig into
3:14these tests
3:14a little bit, you can see here that one is
3:16unused fields. We have this one, which is
3:18one needs
3:19review calculation uses multiple data
3:21sources. You can see this is Amber, not
3:24because this is a bad
3:25thing to do, but because it can sort of
3:27slow things down when you're using multiple
3:29data sources.
3:29Let's say using something like a blend that
3:31does slow down the query time. So Tableau
3:33is just
3:33telling you know, hey, if you can do this
3:35with a single data source, why not do that?
3:38So again,
3:38if you're really sort of looking for those,
3:40you know, fine tuning milliseconds and
3:42performance,
3:43and this is going to be something you can
3:45look at as well. So calculating using
3:47multiple data sources
3:48obviously something there. Again, we've got
3:50these links, but they don't quite go to
3:51where they
3:52should go because the pages haven't been
3:54loaded yet. Now, if I go down to the 10
3:56that passed,
3:56I like that they're showing you what's
3:58working really well. This is sort of a nice
4:00checklist.
4:01So let's just make this a little bit bigger
4:03so you can see what this actually is. So we
4:06've got
4:06the number of data sources being used,
4:08unused data sources, number of views in a
4:10dashboard,
4:11number of visible worksheets, number of
4:13hidden workbook sheets, calculation length,
4:16number of
4:16LODs, multiple connections in the data
4:18sources, number of filter and non-material
4:21ized columns.
4:22So this is a really thorough check. I mean,
4:24if you don't know much about optimizing
4:26workbooks,
4:27if all you did was look at this before you
4:29published and then did a little bit of
4:31research
4:31and use some of the help guides to really
4:33drill into them, what it will do is it will
4:35get you into
4:36a good practice of doing these as you build
4:38in the first place. And so for a lot of
4:40people,
4:40I'm hoping they're just going to open up
4:42Tableau, go to publish, and there'll
4:43probably be an initial
4:44effort to start to try and standardize how
4:47some of this is done within an organization
4:49.
4:49But nonetheless, this is going to be a huge
4:51, huge help. Some of the things I'd love to
4:53see is an API
4:54around this. I can see lots of server
4:56admins who will look at this and go, huh, I
4:58'd love to run
4:58this optimizer score on all the workbooks
5:01on my server so that I can get the work
5:03books that aren't
5:03performing well, see if any of that
5:05correlates with performance issues that I'm
5:07seeing, and maybe
5:08we can tackle that and I can just create a
5:10list, a task list that I can send to users
5:12and say, hey,
5:13I found your workbook. It's getting a low
5:15score on the optimizer. Here are some steps
5:17that are
5:17recommended by Tableau. And by the way,
5:19Tableau have these supporting help guides
5:21to make that
5:21work. That would be a fantastic little step
5:23. I'm sure it's possible. I'm sure this is
5:26just
5:26a early release. Now, the other thing that
5:28I'm looking forward to that I know Tableau
5:30has already
5:30committed to doing in the future at some
5:32point is that they're going to add things
5:34to this test.
5:35Now, I don't know what those will be. All I
5:37know is when Tableau does something like
5:39this, this is
5:40never just the first release. This will get
5:42enhanced in the future. Maybe we'll get
5:43categorization.
5:45That's a little bit of a long list to sort
5:47of stare down. I'd love this to be broken
5:49down into
5:49data sources, design, and optimizations,
5:52you know, that kind of separation. So you
5:54can really break
5:55down where the work needs to be done. Do
5:57you need to go and do this in the data
5:58source or do you
5:59need to go to do this elsewhere? And the
6:01other thing I'd love to see is some tests
6:03around
6:03accessibility. Now, I'm not entirely sure
6:06if this is in the works or not, but
6:07nonetheless,
6:08accessibility guidelines have been
6:09something that have been really sort of
6:11prominent over the last
6:12few years and Tableau themselves have been
6:14making strides to improve the accessibility
6:17of dashboards.
6:17I'd love if this test was checking things
6:20like font sizes to check, hey, are you sure
6:22this is,
6:23you know, supporting your needs for the
6:24users if they have issues with this? Is
6:26your mobile
6:27a dashboard optimized for touch? Those
6:29kinds of small things. Is your dashboard
6:32going to work
6:32with a screen reader really, really well?
6:34Are there things you can add to your image
6:36in terms
6:36of metadata to make it easy for someone who
6:38's visually impaired to read the information
6:40using
6:40a screen reader? That kind of stuff would
6:42be super, super helpful and I hope that it
6:44comes
6:45in the future. Nonetheless, I guess this is
6:46why this is version one because we can
6:48always feed
6:49these ideas back into the product. But
6:50nonetheless, I think this is really cool.
6:52Now, if you do make
6:54changes to this optimizer, you can rerun
6:56the optimizer right at the bottom. So you
6:58can see
6:58here at the bottom, you can just rerun it
7:00and it keeps a score from the last time you
7:02run it. So
7:03you can see last run at 3.10. If I go ahead
7:06and close this, it goes back to the usual
7:08dashboard.
7:08If I go back, hit publish workbook, it'll
7:11open it up again. And if I go back into the
7:14optimizer
7:14again, it has the last run that I did. So
7:17when you open it, it's not redoing the run.
7:20You have to go
7:21back in here and rerun the optimizer. You
7:23'll get a new time because I've run it
7:25within the minute.
7:26It's not quite sort of setting up. You'll
7:28get a new run here at the bottom and then
7:29you can go and
7:30check this thing. So it's like a proactive
7:32to-do list. You can fix something, get it
7:34to work and
7:35hopefully see that change in the future as
7:37well. So I think this is a really nice
7:38feature. I'm not
7:39going to go too much into the mechanics of
7:41how it works and so on. I think it's pretty
7:43self-explanatory
7:44and one thing I should have done is just go
7:46on and essentially finish the cycle. So you
7:49can essentially
7:49just go on, do everything you need to do
7:51here. Go to workbook optimizer. If you
7:53close it, it closes
7:55the whole thing down. I would like that to
7:57go back to the publish workbook interface
8:00so I don't
8:00have to keep sort of hopping around. I don
8:02't know if I'm potentially missing a step
8:04here. If I hit
8:06escape, it just goes back. So you know, I
8:07don't know if I'm missing something if
8:09there's a shortcut,
8:10but I'd love to be able to just go back to
8:12this page so I can make changes if that
8:14makes sense
8:15and in a familiar place that I'm sort of
8:17used to. But nonetheless you do have the
8:19publish step right
8:20there. So when you're done you hit publish
8:22and it carries on with the publish as
8:24normal. So you do
8:25get this back here and you can go ahead
8:27publish. That didn't actually sort of make
8:28as obvious sense
8:29to me. Now that it's done it, it makes a
8:31lot more sense and you know, it should just
8:33go back to the,
8:34it should just say back and then I'll go
8:36back to this and then we can go. Anyway
8:38that's a small
8:38thing. Hit overwrite and off the workbook
8:40goes. I'm publishing to Tableau Online. Now
8:43this is also
8:44going to be available on WebEdit so you'll
8:45be able to do this in the browser which is
8:47perfectly fine.
8:48I don't have an instance of Tableau Online
8:50that's been updated with that feature just
8:52yet,
8:52so I can't show you the web interface but
8:54it's pretty much the same. It's pretty much
8:56the same
8:56capability as you'd expect anywhere else.
8:59So I think this is going to be a really
9:00nice quality
9:01of life improvement especially for people
9:03who are looking to improve their workbook
9:05performance. Now
9:06one thing I'm going to do if you've not
9:08seen my video about the Tableau Exchange,
9:11one particular aspect of the Tableau
9:12Exchange that I get really frustrated with
9:14are the accelerators.
9:16Now the accelerators are essentially
9:17templates. They're designed to help speed
9:19up the work that
9:20you're doing but in my view a lot of the
9:22accelerators don't really stick to best
9:24practice. So in another video I'm going to
9:27be taking the you know 10 or so acceler
9:29ators,
9:30maybe even all of them, maybe we'll do that
9:32. We'll take all of them, run them through
9:33this
9:34optimizer and see how well they score on
9:36that basis. So check out that video once it
9:39's uploaded
9:39on the channel. Stay subscribed, join us on
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9:54catch you in the next video. Thanks for
10:00watching.
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