Introduction

In the previous chapter, you performed some fundamental data transformations such as joins, filtering, and groups using Tableau Desktop. However, Tableau Desktop only performs basic data manipulation. It may not be able to handle raw unprocessed/unclean data, like data containing multiple entries, missing entries, or inconsistent formats. Now, you will learn about more advanced methods, better suited to these trickier scenarios.

Tableau Prep is a tool specifically designed to perform data transformation so we can use the data for our visualizations. It consists of advanced algorithms that help detect data inconsistencies and fix them. This can be done automatically as well as manually, depending on the requirements.

In this chapter, you will learn about the Prep interface, along with data operations like adding data sources, data profiling, and applying transformations such as cleaning, splitting, adding pivots, joining data sources, and applying unions. Finally...