“The need to see and understand data has never been greater. Enhancements in Tableau 10.2 make advanced analytics easier, faster and more scalable,” said Andrew Beers, Chief Development Officer, Tableau Software.
“We’ve added new ways to leverage spatial data, prep data and manage Tableau deployments in the enterprise. Visualizations are easier for people with disabilities to perceive and explore, making data accessible to everyone to increase business value and insights.”
Advanced mapping
According to Tableau, companies that want to leverage data locked in geospatial files and are visualized through specialized mapping programs, can now use Spatial File Connector to access spatial data directly in the software for easy geospatial analysis. The new version also connects to ESRI Shapefiles, KML, GeoJSON and MapInfo file types.
Data prep made easy
The 10.2 release claims to accelerate the process of combining and cleaning data, so that enterprises can get to analysis faster. It lets people union tables from a database that will help leverage database structure and schemas in an efficient manner. The new release can also automatically recognize dates and make dates uniform without the need of scripting or complex calculations. Enterprises can also transform data from a string to a date type using Automatic DateParse. The new version also has the ability to union tables from a SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, Postgres, Redshift, or HP Vertica database.
Advanced conformance
Tableau states that with the new release, visualizations can be made conformant to the current Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.0 AA) drafted by the Web Accessibility Initiative. This means that users who are subject to US Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 can author and publish Tableau content with features that make it easier for people with disabilities to perceive and explore. Common visualization elements now have keyboard support and function with assistive technologies such as screen reading software. These new capabilities ensure that a customer’s visualizations reach the largest possible audience.
Increased IT governance
Tableau 10.2 claims to provide fine-grained controls over guest access and improves the connectivity with SAP BW with Single Sign-on support. The company states that it now supports the security rules defined in SAP BW and ensures that users can only see the data that they are authorized to see.
Data connectors
Last year the company added connectors to Anaplan for business planning data and Eloqua for marketing automation and campaign data. The new release adds connectors for Apache Drill and Microsoft SharePoint lists. The 10.1 brought support for JSON, a direct connector to Marketo, web authoring improvements, more mapping capabilities and new APIs.
The company has also release a new mobile toolbar for iOS with an enhanced sharing experience and claims to have made more space for visualizations.
