Tableau Web Data Connector


Table of contents

  1. Connectors
    1. Example
  2. Limitations of Tableau Web Data Connectors

Connectors

Tableau Web Data Connectors enable web data source connections, specifically JSON data sources. The example discussed herein reads JSON data files hosted by GitHub.


Example

Imagine a task wherein we have to illustrate the daily

  • $\small{deaths_{c}/100K}$ $vs.$ $\small{positives_{c}/100K}$
  • $\small{positives_{c}/100K}$ $vs.$ $\small{tests_{c}/100K}$

wherein

$c$: cumulative

in relation to SARS-CoV-2Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 infections in the states & territories of the United States; in well managed settings, the time varying gradients of the ensuing curves, and the forecasts of such curves, could be quite helpful. We might opt for 2 graph data sources

  • capita.json A source that summarises each day's rate values per state.
  • gazetteer.json a gazetteer file, i.e., a file that summarises geographic, etc., facts of each state.

In this example, each data source is read by its own Tableau Web Data Connector. In brief. The data source capita.json is read by a connector named capita.html, which reads the source via script file capita.js; the schema of capita.json is detailed in capita.js. And, data source gazetteer.json is read by a connector named gazetteer.html, which reads the source via script file gazetteer.js; the schema of gazetteer.json is detailed in gazetteer.js.

The data sets are joined, via a common key, prior to drawing the graphs illustrated below.



Limitations of Tableau Web Data Connectors

Alas, the tools required for automatically updating Tableau graphs based on Tableau web data connector feeds are only available via Tableau Online or Tableau Server; Tableau Public projects can’t be updated automatically.