Top 10 Sessions from TCC13

Who doesn't love a list? Especially a list of the top TCC13 sessions that help take your data to ta-da!

At last - the list of Top 10 2013 Tableau Customer Conference sessions (based on feedback and popularity from this year's attendees) and now available for everyone to view. After all it’s about bringing Data to the People!

Here they are (in no particular order):

1. Blending: All the things you didn't know you could do
   
   Will it Blend? Cubes and Tables? Files and Databases? Security and entitlements? In this session we will throw all kinds of business focused questions around Data Blending in to the mixer and see what comes out. We will also highlight some of the great improvements in Version 8 to data blending. Forget ETL, this session is set to Pulse and we will all find out together if it in fact, blends.
2. How Tableau Makes Being a Little Dangerous Extremely Dangerous
   
   If a little bit of knowledge is dangerous, what does a whole lot of knowledge make you? Tableau has helped RadiumOne, a digital advertising platform, become nearly omniscient in its day-to-day revenue operations and has changed the way the firm uses its data to serve its clients.In this session, you will hear the journey of developing a Tableau platform and what it means to have a tool that fills a critical, but previously unbridgeable, gap between spreadsheets and high cost data analysis. For RadiumOne, the gap has meant the difference between useless noise and real information.
3. Redbox: Using Analytics to Optimize the Largest Retail Network in North America
   
   Redbox is a unique business: an entertainment company with a critical role in content distribution, a nearly ubiquitous consumer-facing brand, and a valued partner for some of the largest retailers in world. More than anything, though, Redbox is about kiosks, and it has a lot of them: over 42,000 kiosks in over 34,000 locations; that’s more than McDonald’s and Starbucks combined in the US. Like any retailer, Redbox is constantly optimizing its physical footprint to ensure placement in the best locations possible and provide the most convenient customer experience. This session will explore how internal big data modeling, combined with rich third-party datasets have transformed the way Redbox approaches its location strategy. The presentation will include many examples of how the Strategy & Analytics team at Redbox uses Tableau to reach new insights and empower collaboration and decision-making across a broad audience throughout the company.
4. Making the most of Calcs: Do’s, Don'ts, and if You Have To’s
   
   In this session we take a close look at how to write efficient calculations in Tableau. We review how the different types of calculations in Tableau are evaluated and what that means for performance. We examine some of the common pitfalls of calculations and how to avoid them. Finally, we cover some best practices and tips for troubleshooting calculations so that you can get the most from Tableau.
5. Getting started with the Java Script API
   
   This session acts as an introduction to the Tableau JavaScriptAPI. You'll learn the why and the how to use the API, and end with a coding demonstration of embedding a dashboard with the JavaScript API and interacting with it. People with all levels of programming prowess are encouraged to checkout this session.
6. Excel to Tableau
   
   Learn how to take the Excel spreadsheets you depend on and supercharge them in Tableau. This talk will cover how to not only duplicate Excel functionality in Tableau, but how to move beyond the constraints of rows and columns and into the world of dynamic and beautiful analyses filled with the power of interactivity.
7. Playstation: Data Visualization at the Speed of Gaming
   
   Video game development is a fast-paced and competitive industry. Having real-time access to the right data lets you turn on a dime and capture market trends you might otherwise miss. This session discusses how Playstation has used Tableau to:
   • Analyze gameplay metrics to gain an edge in development strategy
   • Replace development of custom UI on in-house tools reducing development costs
   • Justify internal spend on cloud infrastructure to increase IT service offerings and save the company millions
8. Understanding Queries & How They Impact Performance
   
   At this session you will learn how to enable swift data exploration, amplify your data models and discover powerful features that will help you maximize Tableau’s performance.
9. Hot Dirty Sets
   
   Everyone likes sets…and Tableau version 8 manages to make sets much, much more fun. In this session we’ll start with the basics and then focus on advanced setual techniques you can use to:
   • Quickly visualize set membership and relationships
   • Simplify and extend elementary cohort analysis
   • Reduce expressions in your workbooks
   • Complex comparisons amongst set members
10. Tips & Tricks for Beginners
    
    Are you a Tableau newbie? Or just curious about how to build views and slice and dice the numbers a bit quicker? In this session, we’ll show you several powerful tips that will help speed up your work in Tableau Desktop.
    
    In this session, we’ll show you:
    • How to work with dimensions and measures—the two types of data that define your views
    • How to use parameters and filters to highlight the most important data
    • How to use dashboard actions to integrate your views with information on the web

    Want more great content? Be sure to join us at TCC14, September 8-12 in Seattle. Our deepest discount expires in just a few days on December 13th. Learn more and register today to save yourselves $400.