Kids can help #VisualizeNoMalaria!

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Kids can help #VisualizeNoMalaria!

Hi, my name is Max. I am eleven years old and I am going into sixth grade.  I LOVE video games and Legos. Yesterday, though instead of playing Minecraft, I volunteered by tracing buildings with my Mom, to help support the fight against Malaria in Zambia.  

I did this because I like to be in the wilderness and go camping and have been bitten by mosquitos many times.  I can’t imagine getting sick or dying from just being bitten by a mosquito and don’t think any kid should worry or suffer from this.

It is really easy to help.  If you want to help too, go this link http://www.tableau.com/about/blog/2016/7/help-visualizenomalaria-56784  and follow the instructions.

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Great Arcs in Tableau by Chris DeMartini

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Great Arcs in Tableau by Chris DeMartini

This is one of many posts on the subject of Great Arcs which ultimately lead us to the re-make of the 1983 cult classic Wargames in Tableau. I encourage you to read the whole series of posts by the wider team in addition to this one.

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The New Fabulous Mapbox Studio Tutorial - Making a more Accessible Map

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The New Fabulous Mapbox Studio Tutorial - Making a more Accessible Map

Here is an example of how beautiful your new maps can be.  This one was designed to be a background map that was elegant and provided an alternate to just the black, white, and that other one that no one uses, that come pre-designed in Tableau.   Check it out live and zoom in and out.  Notice the color gradations as you zoom in close.  Those would have taken forever to get right in Classic, not to mention how amazingly smooth it is to zoom in and out and pan around.  This is a map Ferrari!

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Building a Visualization of Transit System Data Using GTFS

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Building a Visualization of Transit System Data Using GTFS

The General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) defines a common format for public transportation schedules and associated geographic information. GTFS "feeds" allow public transit agencies to publish their transit data and developers to write applications that consume that data in an interoperable way.  This post shows you how to use this data to create interactive transit maps in Tableau.

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Create multiple custom map layers in Mapbox that you can toggle on and off in Tableau

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Create multiple custom map layers in Mapbox that you can toggle on and off in Tableau

This adds onto the Mapbox customization for Tableau by showing you how to:

  • Import custom shapefiles
  • Edit them in QGIS (optional)
  • Style them in Mapbox
  • Add them to a Tableau .tms so you can toggle them on and off in many combinations to help your visual analysis.
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Fast and Fabulous Custom Maps using Mapbox in Tableau

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Fast and Fabulous Custom Maps using Mapbox in Tableau

So the last time I wanted a custom map, I ended up building my own WMS and spending months and $’s to get the map I wanted.  If you followed that advice - good for you. You and I can now drink at at Tableau conference and tell the young’ins about how we used to have to walk uphill in the snow, wearing only flip flops and a Magnum BI t-shirt, while being pelted with popsicles to get our maps. Then one day recently, I had a cocktail with Allan Walker (that insane mapping Zen dude) who pointed out that if you just opened up a .tms file in notepad, there just wasn’t all that much to it but a wee bit of xml. 

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30 Minutes… Bay Area Bike Share

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30 Minutes… Bay Area Bike Share

This is an entry for the Bay Area Bike Share data challenge sponsored by Stamen Design.  Allan Walker and I decided to examine the announcement of the expansion of SF bike station locations to new neighborhoods and see how that would affect the ability to use the service as a viable commuting option for different locations in the city.  Please visit the mapping methodology tab to understand the geo-spacial calculations Allan used to create the routes and service area visualizations data and information used to create the viz.

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This Story Starts with an Irresistible Map

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This Story Starts with an Irresistible Map

I wanted a Stamen style map in my Viz!  No problem actually, as I could easily design it and export it as an image.  Then I could just use it as background image in Tableau after assigning some Lat, Long coordinates to it.  Viz done… booyah!

Wait, I can't drill into the map and zoom and stuff?

Captains Log… Feb. 6th.  Love the look of my knock off from China town.  I think Shrimp Boy may have had a hand in it even, but I want a real pink pony...

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