Time trend analysis ailments at the TCC12 Tableau Doctor's office

A post from Jennifer Vaughan, Tableau Product Consultant, at the Tableau Customer Conference: New patients at today’s TCC Tableau Doctor are still experiencing the 3 Common Symptoms at the TCC Tableau Doctor Office with additional cases of formatting and date time analysis on the brain.

Are you looking to do time trend analysis and want to know how to do this? Are you also having a case of the common cold er. date?

The Tableau Doctor prescription: a line chart using continuous or discrete dates.

A line chart is the best type of chart to view trends of data over time. While looking at the sum of sales over time, time comes in two different options: discrete or continuous. By default dates are discrete, whereas a continuous is a user selected option. With the option, you create a continuous quantity or an axis as opposed to a header on the row or column shelves with a discrete. Put another way, you can view the seasonality of your sales with discrete or you can see your sales from start to finish for each month using continuous.

To analyze how a specific field affects the rest of your data in a view, you can take your line chart to the next level of analysis by breaking a view into a series of pages, using the Pages shelf. Learn more about the Pages shelf.

Swing by the Tableau Doctor offices if you're onsite at #tcc12 for some in-person assistance with all things Tableau. Appointments can be made on Level 5 - Cobalt Foyer or Level 2 at Registration desks.