Reading an Excel file –
There are several data connection available in tableau but In this post we will see how to read an excel file in tableau.
When you open tableau, you will see various data connection on the left navigation bar.
All the data connections under ‘To a File’ can be accessed using Tableau Desktop Personal. And all the data connections under ‘To a Server’ can be accessed using Tableau Desktop Professional.
At the bottom we have ‘Saved Data Sources’ which contains some sample datasets for analysis.
Let’s open the Sample – Superstore Excel File. On My computer it resides under the path “C:\Program Files\Tableau\Tableau 2022.1\defaults\Datasources\Sample – Superstore.xls”
You path might be little bit different but you can find Inside Tableau folder in Program Files. You can also click directly on the Sample -superstore file under Saved Data sources if you did not find it.
So, To read an Excel file first click on Microsoft Excel under the To a File. This will open the windows explorer.
Select the location of the Excel file that you want to open. This will open a dialog box like this.
In tableau Excel Workbook are treated as a database and each individual sheet is a table. This allow you to join multiple sheets together like you do with SQL databases.
To open a sheet pr table, drag it to the right hand side space. Let’s open the orders table.
Let’s say you want to join the returns table with the orders table. First drag the returns table to the right hand side space.
By default, Tableau will try it best and connect two sheets with a columns which is common in both tables. If you are not satisfied with it then you can change it from the ‘Edit Relationship` option.
Once you satisfied with everything. click on the sheet1 at the bottom left, this will open the interface for creating charts.
In our upcoming posts, we will learn how to create different kinds of charts in tableau.