Data Types in Tableau and Alteryx

After a warm welcome to the Data School Hamburg, we hit the ground running in our first week of work. Before diving into Tableau Prep later in Week 1 and Tableau Desktop in Week 2, we focused on laying the theoretical groundwork for future endeavours. Among many other interesting topics we discussed data types. In this blog post I will tell you why you should care about data types and what these data types look like.

Why are data types important?

In Tableau and Alteryx,  as well as in many more programming languages, data types determine the characteristic of a value. Therefore, data types provide you with structure and ensure that the correct behaviour is performed for each data type considering their distinct characteristics. Furthermore, some analyses and visualisations are only possible for certain data types. For example, it is not possible to compute an average for a boolean or create a map based on numeric values.

What are the data types?

Even though data types vary between programming languages, there are many similarities. The following table provides you with an overview of the data types in Tableau and Alteryx. For a more detailed overview of the data types in each program check out the further reading section.

While Tableau has the extra feature of including images through url, Alteryx has the benefit of more specific data types such as dividing strings into String, W_String, V_String, and V_W_String.

If you would like to know more about Data Types, check out the two links below.

Further Reading:

Data Types in Tableau

Data Types in Alteryx