Update 2: This is announced as fixed in Tableau Desktop 8.2.2 but not in server
http://vizdiff.blogspot.com/2014/08/tableau-bug-fix-color-palette-range.html

Update 1: After communicating with Tableau support staff, the question came down to: whose color range definition to respect? The user's or the data source range?

In the absence of color range definition, Tableau uses the data source's lowest-highest values to set color range. That's totally fine.

However, when the user has defined the color range, Tableau has no excuse but to follow the user's definition.

For example, the user defines the color range to be 1-100. Even if the the data source has a range of 10-20 or -100 to +200, you just can't use those as the color range. You have to respect what the user defines. He means it.

In my case, I defined 2 of the 3 control points of the color range. I want them to be respected. Tableau can't alter it by saying that the data source only contains zeros. My definition must have priority over the data range.

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In a heat map, I need to assign red color to value 0 and green to all values above 0. Currently all the data are made 0 just for showing what the problem is. I am using Tableau 8.1.6.

The Red-Green Diverging Palette is selected. The way I define the color range is Start==0, Center==1, and leave End open. To my surprise, the color range is made to be 0-0 as we can see a 0 is automatically placed in End box by default. The Center value is totally ignored. And I get all my values to be green. Changing Center value to higher value doesn't have any effect. The total palette remains green. From 0-1, the color is supposed to be red but it is not working.

Tableau customer support staff replied that the upper limit is detected automatically in case it is left open. It seems the detection algorithm is to pick the lower limit rather than the center value. This logic surprises me very much.



If I give a fixed number to End, then it works. But, in most cases, I don't know what the highest value is for End. And it's an option to not give one.


A fix would be to simply make the color range to be Start-Center if no value is larger than Center.
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Jake and I collaborated on a dashboard. He told me that he learnt a way to create an in-place help page in Tableau. He first saw it at a conference somewhere and couldn't recall who the speaker was. So I am blogging here about it but the credit goes to somebody else. If anyone knows who the original creator is, leave a comment below.

The key idea is to float a semi transparent worksheet on top of the dashboard, where a help text box is strategically placed on top of each chart. This way, we can explain how to view each chart and what data points are important, etc. This worksheet is collapsible by a show/hide button. 

Below I would like to show how this worksheet can be constructed.

1. Sheet with a single data mark.

  • Double click the empty space in Marks panel and add two single quotes. Make the null pill a text label. This creates a single null mark.
  • Set the view as "Entire View"

2. Create an show/hide button

  • Go to the target dashboard
  • Drag a floating vertical container to the dashboard, making it cover all the area of interest.
  • Drag the Single Null Mark sheet and drop it into the above container. Hide the sheet title.
  • Create an open/close button for the container and place the button at the top-right corner.

3. Add annotations

  • Format the sheet background opacity as 70% in the layout manager             
  • Select area annotations and place them anywhere of interest. 
  • Write help text and format it to highlight important messages.  
  • The text can serve as functional guide and/or insight guide.

Here is an example. Feel free to download the workbook and explore. Click the "i" button at the top-right corner to view the in-place help. 

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