Most analytics software—big data or otherwise—is cube-based, so to speak. By that we mean that virtually all users of that type of application are housed in offices somewhere, cranking out answers to complicated questions submitted by fellow employees or contractors in other locations.
There are many reasons for this, and they are mostly about convention. Usually, people who use analytics applications sit in offices and prefer to be as securely connected to their data stores as possible. There are data gatherers, and there are data analyzers. But as of Sept. 15, this has changed.
Tableau Software has released Tableau 9.1, which offers additional data resources, new native connectors to resources, and a new iPad app.
The object is to make it easier for people to collect and analyze data from any resource while either in the office or while traveling. New capabilities in the version give users more ways to answer questions with data and new options for connecting to data and easier security and authentication for the enterprise, Ellie Fields, Tableau Vice President of Product Marketing, told eWEEK.
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"The real value of this new release is the improved connection to data—all kinds of data," Fields said. "Our new Web-based connectors allow people to write very simple scripts and present URLs out to folks to connect to any kind of Web data source out there."
Thus enterprises can connect directly to public sources such as Twitter's API, Facebook's API, marketplaces like eBay and Amazon, and so on. "This also can be used for enterprises, because many of them are writing their own Web services," Fields said.
Tableau 9.1 is built on the enterprise-class Tableau Server and features capabilities such as single sign-on for SAP HANA and support for SAP variables; mutual SSL authentication; product updates; scheduled Active Directory Sync; and Rest API updates. This all makes it easier to deliver self-service analytics at scale, Fields said.
These new Web data connectors enable developers who use Tableau to connect to a limitless number of sources, Chief Development Officer and co-founder Chris Stolte said. Tableau 9.1's new native connectors can be used for data sources such as SAP and Google Cloud SQL, he added.
The Tableau Mobile App also features Offline Snapshots so users can save favorite views that can be seen offline at any time.
Here's a use case involving the new version: "We built a dashboard that dynamically calculates price realization across all of our markets and channels on the fly and deployed it on Tableau Mobile. My boss can run the report from his iPad in Maine on the weekend," said Kris Munson, Director of Strategic Pricing at Watts Water Technologies.
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