I released a new free tool that allows you to easily convert an Excel/CSV file into a JSON file for networks. It's available here: www.ladataviz.com/tools/jsonify It'll simplify the process a lot! If you have an issue getting additional quotes when copying the data from Tableau to the code editor, try copy-pasting first in Excel. This could come from different locale settings or operating systems. The end goal is the same: use Tableau to generate a string allowing you to build the JSON in its correct format quickly 🙂
hello @ladataviz, I'm so exicited for these chart, and I want to know, if the data comes from RDBMS or something like that, how to convert the data easily to JSON file for these networks chart? are there any explanation about that?
@@rizkinugrah4@rizkinugrah4, you can use any tools you want to convert your data as you manage to have the .json in the right format with a list of nodes and links.
@@IrisSunCoq There is no notion of 'level' in the network. Your countries, provinces, and cities are all nodes. And you have links between them. You can create an attribute "type" in your nodes to differentiate the countries/provinces/etc Maybe this will help: public.tableau.com/app/profile/zach.bowders/viz/AllofUs/_
For me, the hardest part was copying from Tableau :) For some reason, ctrl+c was not working well for me. I found it so much easier to download the nodes and links as a .csv file and copy-pasting from that to the .json file. Thank you so much for creating this video and making the tool available on your website.
Merci! Merci! Merciiii!!!!!!! Thank you so much for creating this, from the bottom of my undergrad researcher heart! 💖 I took on an super-ambitious project and needed a way to quickly visualize online interactions to (dis)prove my hypothesis... and I had less than a week to complete my analysis and write the paper after I finished coding... then I realized that network graphs were not a built-in option in Tableau 😮 @ladatavis your tools saved the day and totally disrupted my initial researcher bias... leading me to way more interesting findings. 🎉 I'm in social sciences and have no data science or CS background, so the fact that I could use your tool to gain insight into my data and move my research forward is a huge testament to the work you put into it. Thank you again for sharing it ❤
Amazing tutorial! It would be even better if we can connect our own data (regularly updated data) to automatically update the graph. Not sure it's possible since the X and Y are seem to be randomly generated inside the ladataviz backend.
For those that aren't able to copy the data from Tableau, I was able to work around this by saving the workbook to Tableau Public. Make sure to make your column with the custom calculated field wide enough. Then from Tableau Public, I showed all sheets and then downloaded the sheets I needed as PDFs. I was able to select the data in the column (one page at a time) and copy from the PDF!
Great tip @RU-vidmily! I released a new tool that allows you to easily convert a Excel/CSV into a JSON file. It's available here: www.ladataviz.com/tools/jsonify I think it simplifies the process a lot! Let me know what you think!
Hi @ladataviz. Thank you so much for your tool. Awesome work. Quick question, I created a nice shape network in your tool, but when I opened the twbx file in Tableau, it looks completely different with nodes moving around and does not look like a network anymore although they are still connected. Do you know why?
Hey! Are you using the Tableau Desktop export or Tableau Public? Make sure that there is no comma in the name of your nodes, as this can break the csv and create unexpected results. If none of this work, please reach out by email, so we can figure out what's wrong :)
@@ladataviz Thanks @ladataviz. I fixed the issue. Now I am trying to add color to nodes in Tableau Desktop, but somehow the links between nodes are blurred. I also did not see how to configure links in Tableau marks. Only nodes in the menu. Can I please have your email? Thanks a lot.
This is amazing. One question is it possible to show subcategories as a drill down from categories in the extension you have? I have created something similar in Tableau using d3.js but it is not as visually appealing as yours, I was able to create a nodes as categories which can then be drill down with a click and it will show the sub-categories, I would like to try the same feature in the extension you have built.
Excellent tutorial - I have one issue, when I copy and paste the data to visual studio, I get extra quotation marks in the data - do you know how I can fix this?
It depends on your computer language and how it interprets the different quotes. For me, the attributes and string in JSON need double quote ". So to generate/concatenate the string in Tableau in need to wrap it in with a single quote '. Try it out with simple strings and copy and paste into VS Code to see the result. If you still have an issue, you can reach out to me on Twitter or via my website!
@@shutterframephotography Good tip! . I'm thinking that it could also probably come from the OS. I'm on iOS and probably the copy/pasting of data on Windows is slightly different.
Hi @ladataviz. Thank you so much for your tool!! I am running into an issue - I created a nice shape network in your tool, but when I opened the twbx file in Tableau, it looks completely different with everything moved around. Do you know why? I am using Tableau desktop and do not have any commas in my nodes
This often happens when there is some special character in the data. I can take a look at your data if you send it to me. You can use the contact form on my website
Great video! i was wondering if there is a way to automatically change the data to refresh the view on tableau, or every time i have to generare the network?
Hi! Currently you have to regenerate a network with the tool if your data change. It’s something I’m well aware and it annoys me too! I’m trying to find a good way to automatize it. However if you already built your visualization you can just export the network in csv and simply refresh the data source in tableau instead of redesign everything ;)
There is definitely a plan to showcase the rest, yes. And of course I’ll continue to work on the software to create more generators and then more video!
Great Video! I am trying to replicate this for my dataset. I made sure the syntax in my json file is correct, but I am getting the following error. Could you please help with this? "Error: node not found: undefined"
This is awesome. I tried it and it worked. However, I attempted adding 1 more layer of notes and links and I get a node not found error. After I added the new nodes, I just repeated the process for the links again and had my new nodes link just to the second level. Is that how you do it, or is there an extra step when adding a third layer?
Thanks so much for your video Tristan! Love what this tool allows me to do. Question for you, do you know of a way to make a directional network? So that rather than simple links, there are directional arrows? I went down this rabbit hole when I was coding the JSON file with "source" and "target".
I *think* you should be able to do that in Tableau after exporting. Since a link has a type (source or target) you can identify the targets and maybe add a shape. The shape will not be an arrow (because I can't see how to set the right position) but it can be used to identify the direction.
Instead of uploading my data to a website, is there an offline option for data prep? You should've included that for folks using confidential company data
The data is not uploaded or stored anywhere. You can open the page, go offline, and still input a new workbook and use the tool. If you refresh or close the page, it's gone. It's like if you drag and drop a picture from your computer in your browser. The browser can read it, but it's not uploaded anywhere.
No idea what it is different for you. As you can see I just started with the Sample Superstore data source from the Saved Data Sources pre-installed in Tableau. But this is not important for the tutorial, you can use any other field like State, Segment, or Ship Mode.
Hello, it's amazing that there is a way to make a network graph into a tableau. To some extent, it was surprising that the results were produced. Thank you. But there are also some difficulties. First of all, my json file didn't show all the network graphs on the screen maybe because there was too much data. And it was sad because when I downloaded it from the tableau desktop, it sometimes came out differently from the network screen of the tool you made. I think it's my lack of skills. Anyway, I'd appreciate it if you could give me a response
Are you sure you have made an extract of your data source? This is necessary to publish on Tableau Public. Apart from that, nothing about creating a network in Tableau makes it not publishable. I actually published mine here: public.tableau.com/app/profile/ladataviz/viz/CreateaNetworkinTableau/MakeaNetworkinTableau
Do you mean that when you download the file from tools.ladataviz.com/network then you can not open it with Tableau Public? That is sadly normal as the exported file can only be opened with Tableau Desktop for moment (because the tool can't generate an hyper file). The good news is that next week I'll update the tool to allow you to download a Tableau Public working template + the generated data in CSV. You'll only need to refresh the extract of the template with the new data and you'll be able to publish it. I hope this answer your question!
If you want to connect this to the data you're using so as new categories and sub categories are added new nodes are produced, what is the best way to do this? Or even just connecting it to be used as a filter. Right now its only functioning as a stand alone visual
If you need a network that is automatically connected to data, you should then not use Tableau but have the network directly build on the web with d3 (that's how I built the tool). It is only functioning as a stand alone tool at the moment, that is why it's free :)
@@ladataviz Is there a way to link them via relationship/blends using the ID in the node or link tables? I essentially just want the id in the links nodes table to serve as filter or highlight action for my data
That is entirely doable. When you export the tableau file, you'll have a twbx connected to a CSV file. You can add a join or relation with any other data source.
Hey, thanks for your great efforts!!!! i have a question, does the code have to be in a Json file in order to work? Because im saving the code in Notepad++ as a .txt and when i upload the file on LADATAVIZ, a failure is occuring (SyntaxError: Expected ',' or ']' after array element in JSON at position 3963) and dont know what to do :(
JSON files with Nodes / Links structure is mandatory to create a network (with my tool, and generally on the web). You can use another of my tool, www.ladataviz.com/tools/jsonify to convert csv data to json
You can use Parameter action to get the clicked node id and then filter or highlight. Here's an example: public.tableau.com/app/profile/ladataviz/viz/LatinoGang/LatinoGang-EN
Many thanks that worked. Now is it possible when i filter on a part to have that take the full screen size? Like dynamic magnification? I sent you an email on this too. Many thanks @@ladataviz
can you show us how to do it directly in tableau? this way the file could be uploaded to tableau cloud and be refreshed automatically. Also Is there a way to include more categories? for example i have 4 different columns each representing articles in a shopping bag, and i want to see the relationship between them, can I just add more sources for each column and more links? Thanks!
You can't do it directly in Tableau, that's why I built those tools. They are not perfect but it's the best solution. If you need a network with data refreshed automatically I'd recommend not using Tableau. You can have as many types of nodes as you want. The only important thing with a network is to have list of nodes, and a list of links explaining the relation. Your node can have different categories.
Thanks for the quick response! Ok I added more nodes but I am having trouble with the links, how do you think is the best way to create the links? @@ladataviz
There is no best way to create links. It'll depend on your data. The only rule is that all your source and target in the links must be nodes. Take it slowly, maybe don't try to generate a big and complex network right away but focus on understanding how the JSON structure works. I created another tool to simplify creating the JSON from a Excel / CSV file. www.ladataviz.com/tools/jsonify
