What is Tableau Server and why should I care?

Tableau Server is a web-based application that provides Tableau Desktop users with the ability to upload and store interactive dashboards and data sources within a centralized location. Once content has been published to Tableau Server, the owner has the ability to determine the individual users or groups who have access to it and to what extent. Content such as dashboards, worksheets, and stories can be easily shared by providing a hyperlink. This platform fosters and enhances collaboration, knowledge sharing, data exploration, and data communication.

This book has been written to benefit Tableau Server end users and content creators first and foremost. Learning how to navigate and leverage Tableau Server is the primary focus of this book. This book will help you to understand the tools that are used to drive the engagement and utilization of this amazing platform within your group or organization.

If you are reading this book, you might already be familiar with a Tableau product such as Tableau Desktop, Tableau Public, Tableau Prep, or one of the many other products the company offers. Conversely, you might have no experience with Tableau or any other data analytics or data visualization software at all and were just granted access. Whichever camp you fall into, this book can help you. Why? Well, this book is written for the majority of users: the people who create and publish content and the end users with whom this content is shared. It is not an expectation that the reader of this book is or plans to become a Tableau Server Administrator or possess the knowledge of a Tableau Zen Master.

This book is written for regular analysts and developers who just want to gain a better understanding of this product to increase their productivity, drive engagement, and increase the utilization of their data-driven products. The reasons for wanting to explore this topic can be multifaceted and varied: for self-growth, for the better dissemination of information, or to gain a competitive advantage. Whatever your goal with Tableau Server, this book will help.

Tableau Desktop is where data analysis and visualization take place. But then what? Next, you need to share this information with consumers. Historically, this has been done by sharing unsecured reports with static data in the form of a spreadsheet or slide. Tableau Server provides information to consumers via a more secure, interactive, and automatable process to accomplish a task.

There are several major benefits of Tableau Server, including the following:

• Automation: Instead of using a static report that needs to be updated every week, month, or quarter, you can connect to a report that has a live connection to your data or that updates at scheduled intervals selected by the creator of the report or Tableau Administrator.
• Customization: You can tweak an existing piece of content to your own specifications (for example, you can filter a report you use by default to only show a particular region when you log on) or edit a piece of content right on the server using the Web Edit feature.
• Data security: When your company hosts its own server, it allows itself to set up and alter the specifications based on the data privacy policies determined by your organization.
• Organization: You can have all of your data stored within a single location. This can help you to create a single source of truth for your data and reporting.
• Subscriptions: You can send an automated email to be delivered to selected users or groups who are interested in receiving a report. You even can schedule when the email is delivered so that it is sent after an extract refresh occurs to ensure email recipients are only being notified when a report contains the most recent data.

After completing this chapter, you should have a broader understanding of Tableau Server and how it relates to other Tableau products. You will also have a clear understanding of the different licenses, site roles, and permissions available and how they interact with one another. Let's begin by looking at Tableau's basic structure and where Tableau Server falls within it.