Upgrade to Tableau Server 2020.4

Planning an upgrade to Tableau Server 2020.4? Start here!

Download Server 2020.4

Know Before you Upgrade

Beginning in Tableau Server 2020.4, Tableau Server configured for mutual SSL authentication will block authentication of users with client certificates that use the SHA-1 signing algorithm. Users who attempt to login with SHA-1 client certificates will encounter an "Unable to sign in" error. For more information about responding to this change, see this Knowledge Base article. 

For more information about why this change was implemented, see this Tableau Community post and the National Institute of Standards and Technology Policy on Hash Functions.

Upgrade

Guide to Upgrading

Inform Your Users

Learn

Overview

Extend the value of your data across your entire organization with Tableau Server. The Tableau Server platform is easy to deploy, scale, and monitor.

What's New?

  • What's New in Tableau Server 2020.4
    • Offline Map Support
    • Resource Monitoring Tool available on Linux 
    • Azure External Repository and Key Vault
    • Enable and configure Catalog or Metadata API indexing limits 

What Has Changed?

New in Tableau Server 2020.4

Start by reading What's New in Tableau Server on Windows | What's New in Tableau Server on Linux
Make sure you check out current guidance before you upgrade:

New for Server or Site Administrators

 

Enable and configure Catalog or Metadata API indexing limits

A new tsm configuration set command allows enabling and configuring Catalog or Metadata API indexing limits, also called event throttling, for new and updated content. 
 

Configure Tableau Server for offline maps

Beginning with version 2020.4, you can configure Tableau Server to use offline maps that are installed with Tableau. For more information, see Displaying Maps in an Air-Gapped Environment.
 

Turn off Web Page objects

To prevent Web Page objects in dashboards from displaying target URLs, do either of the following:
  • For a specific site, deselect Enable Web Page Objects in the site settings.
  • For an entire server, set the vizqlserver.web_page_objects_enabled configuration key to false.
 

Custom sign in note for server sign in errors

In 2020.4, sign in pages added to the Sign In Customization setting will also appear when a user receives a sign in error, such as failed attempts to log in with SSO (SAML, site SAML, and Open ID) Server administrators can use this note to help users understand how to get a license or why they can't access a site. 
 

Automatic configuration of query cache size

The size of the query cache is now automatically set based on the amount of available system memory. This improves the number of query results that will fit into the cache by default. 

New for Tableau Server Add-ons

 

Resource Monitoring Tool for Tableau Server on Linux

Previously available only for Windows, you can now use the Resource Monitoring tool on Linux to monitor and troubleshoot server health as part of the Server Management Add-on.

 

 

Ask Data Usage and Adoption admin view

The new Ask Data Usage admin view shows you how users engage with Ask Data on a site. The dashboard highlights the top Ask Data users, data sources, and data owners, along with headline value metrics.

 

Tableau Services Manager (TSM)

As of Tableau Server 2018.2, Tableau Services Manager (TSM) is now available for Windows as well as Linux, and replaces tabadmin. This new web-based server configuration and management application contains a new user experience for server administrators – a command-line interface (CLI) and a web interface (both interact with the new TSM REST API).

For more information about TSM, see the following helpful resources:

Upgrading from Older Versions

Upgrading Tableau Server on Windows from 2018.1 And Earlier Versions

Beginning with 2018.2, please note that the following administration maintenance tasks have changed for Windows:

Installation - The Installation process has changed significantly. Be sure to read the documentation before starting any installation or upgrade.

Upgrade – The upgrade process is new and differs, depending on whether you are upgrading from version 2018.2.x or from a version earlier than 2018.2. Do not upgrade without first reading the procedures for how to upgrade specific to your scenario.

Uninstall - Uninstall works differently now as well. With version 2018.2 and later you do not need to uninstall until after you have upgraded Tableau.

Watch the video Upgrading to Tableau Server with TSM

 

Upgrading Tableau Server on Linux to 2018.2

  • For Tableau Server on Linux, be sure to follow the detailed instructions outlined in the following Tableau Help article: Upgrade Tableau Server on Linux from 10.5.
  • Important: Failing to follow these steps may display warnings and cancel your upgrade. These extra steps only need to be done once during the upgrade to 2018.2.

Share workbooks and data extracts with other users in your organization using Tableau Server!

Read through the links below for advanced knowledge and details:

Troubleshooting Extracts on Tableau Server

If your users experience or report any of the following behaviors while performing an extract task, they may be running into an incompatibility scenario. Please redirect them to the following Knowledge Base articles to resolve the error(s).

Get Help

 
Self-Service Resources

 
 
Technical Support
Open a support case. For the fastest possible support, please include the following information:
  •  
  • Screenshots of the issue and any error messages (expanded)
  • How far you were into the upgrade process
  • Server logs
  • Note: you can take a log file snapshot and send it to Tableau Support directly from the Tableau Services Manager UI or CLI.
  • msinfo32.exe system report
  • Best times to call

 
 
Professional Services
Our consultants can accelerate your upgrade and help you unlock the value in your data.