25 Apr Tableau Dashboard Parameter Actions

In this tutorial, we’ll look at how to use Tableau dashboard parameter actions. We know Parameters as containers of values used to calculate and enter values not present in the original dataset which can be workbook variables like dates, a string of text, numbers, or calculated fields.

We can use the Parameter Actions in Tableau Desktop version 2019.2 upwards, which gives users the ability to change parameter values even more easily.

We will demonstrate by using the Superstore dataset.

Step 1

Open Tableau on your computer, bring in your Superstore Dataset and open a new worksheet.

Go to the top left corner by clicking the small arrow to select create Parameters in order to start off with what we need to do.

The type of Parameter we’ll be creating is a float data type format that accepts values from users. The function responsible for that is the Allowable values we can see in the image below.

Step 2

The next thing to do is to drag the Parameter to the Marks card under the text because we want to change the current values based on our selection.

From what we could see in the image below, we found out that we have the Dollar currency as well. This was added by right-clicking and clicking on format. Go to Fields → Pane → Numbers, select the currency(standard) and select English(United States) as the Locale.

Step 3

Next, we will create another chart in a new worksheet to calculate the Sales by Month. Drag the Order Date(change the view to month) and the Sales into the Pane.

We can edit the Axis Pane to be in currency format by right-clicking and selecting Format. Then click on Axis → Numbers → Scale to change to standard US currency format.

After this, we will place both worksheets in a dashboard to go further with our Parameter Actions.

Step 4

To add a Parameter Action, we will click Dashboard in the top menu and then Actions. Click on the Add Action button and select Change Parameter among the options.

After clicking Change Parameter, tick the sheet to our sales by month(Sheet 2) and select our Parameter as the target Parameter and the Sales with sum Aggregate as the Source Field.

We then have control of the source sheet of the action, whereby whenever we click on the line graph, the Sales value is Overwritten in our my_param Parameter we created, just as what we have below.