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Lesson 14 — Tableau Prep Builder Cheat Sheet

Tableau

In one line: Many beginners confuse these two tools. They serve completely different purposes in the analytics pipeline and are typically used in sequence, not interchangeably.

Key Ideas

1Tableau Prep vs Tableau Desktop — What's the Difference?. Many beginners confuse these two tools. They serve completely different purposes in the analytics pipeline and are typically used in sequence, not interchangeably.

2Connecting Sources in Tableau Prep. Tableau Prep connects to the same data sources as Tableau Desktop — files, databases, cloud services. But in Prep, connections are just the starting point of a flow, n...

3Cleaning Steps — The Core of Data Prep. A Clean step is where most of the transformation work happens. Add one by clicking the + icon on any node and selecting "Add Step". You can chain multiple Clean steps ...

4Join and Union Nodes — Combining Data Sources. Real analytics typically requires combining data from multiple sources. Tableau Prep handles this with dedicated Join and Union nodes that are visually configured — no...

5Output Nodes — Publishing Your Clean Data. Every Prep flow needs at least one Output node — this is where your clean data goes. Outputs can be files or published data sources on Tableau Server/Cloud.