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Reporting with Tableau Online

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Meisterplan
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In this article, we will show you how to add Tableau reports to your Meisterplan.

General

As an example, we will be using our standard Tableau reports which are available for download. Note, any Tableau report can be used. To add a report, you first need to configure the report on your machine, then upload it to Tableau Online, and finally import it to Meisterplan.

Prerequisites

What you need:

  • A Meisterplan SaaS account
  • A Tableau Online account
  • Tableau Desktop installed on your machine

Tableau Online and Tableau Desktop

Tableau Online is required to host your reports online while Tableau Desktop is necessary to edit the reports and upload them to your Tableau Online account.

If you just want to try things out, free trial versions are available here:

Use Our Example Reports or Create Your Own

Downloadable Meisterplan Example Reports for Tableau Online

The pre-built Tableau reports which we use here as an example are available for download at Tableau Public:

You may access two Tableau reports from a trial system (Tableau: Project Pipeline Analysis by Financial Value, Tableau: Optimization of Resource Utilization).

These are stored in Tableau Public and display example data of an unmodified trial database. They are not connected with your reporting database.

Create Your Own Report

If you create your own Tableau report, see this pagefor details on how your Meisterplan's Reporting Database, which you'll access, is structured.

Step 1: Configuring the Reporting Database Access in Tableau Desktop

Tableau must be told where to look for the Meisterplan data to build reports on, this must be done for every Tableau report.

Every Meisterplan instance has its own reporting database which Tableau can access. First you need to get the access information for your Meisterplan’s reporting database.

Opening the Reports View

  • In the left hand side sidebar, select the Reports view. 

Activating External Reporting

  • In the Reports view, click the Reporting Data button to configure external reporting.
  • In the Reporting Data window, select Activate reporting database to provide planning data for external access.

Once you select this option, the reporting server and database, user name and password will automatically be generated and entered here. Click the eye icon to display the password.

Selecting Reporting Data

  • Under Allocation and Capacity Data, select monthly or weekly extraction of allocations, capacities and financials as required.
  • Enter the desired amount of time periods for monthly and/or weekly extraction. 

Please note that the maximum amount of time periods is 60 for each monthly and weekly extraction. Please also note that a higher amount of time periods takes more time to process.

Confirming the Settings and Retrieving Access Information

  • Click OK to confirm all settings and prepare the reporting database.
  • Back in the Reports view, click Reporting Data again to reopen the view for copying the server name, database name, user name and password. You can display the password by clicking on the eye icon.

The credentials displayed in the Reporting Data window in Meisterplan are needed to connect the Tableau reports to your Meisterplan reporting database.

Opening Your Report in Tableau Desktop

  • Start Tableau Desktop and open the report you want to add to Meisterplan. Please note that it may take some time to load the report.
  • Enter the access information displayed in Meisterplan in the credential box, like in the following image.

There are three different ways of accessing the credential box:

  1. If the dialog in the following image appears automatically after opening the report in Tableau Desktop, click on Edit connection. This will immediately open the credential box.

  2. If the first dialog window is not shown (for example, if it was accidentally closed), click on the Data Source tab on the lower left. 
    The credential box should now show automatically.

  3. If the credential box is still not shown, click on the small downwards arrow in the Connections field on the upper left and select Edit Connection.
  • Once the credential box is visible, enter the access information for your reporting database displayed in Meisterplan. Copy the pre-populated information from the Reporting Data window for your Meisterplan system to the respective fields. Do not change the Port field, which should remain as 5432.
  • The Tableau report will now be opened and populated. You may edit it as required (e.g., change custom fields).
  • If the reports are using a data extract instead of a live connection (which is the case for reports downloaded from Tableau Public), make sure you set the Connection at the top right hand side of the Data source tab to Live:

  • It is also best practice to save a copy of the report before uploading to Tableau Online.

Step 2: Uploading Your Report to Tableau Online

Now that the report is properly configured, you need to upload it to Tableau Online so your Meisterplan can access it.

Connecting Tableau Desktop to Your Tableau Online Account

  • In Tableau Desktop, make sure that the Data Source tab is not active by selecting any of the other tabs:

  • To connect Tableau Desktop to your Tableau Online account, open the Server menu and select the Sign In… option:

  • In the Tableau Server Sign In window, select Tableau Online as Server and click Connect:

  • Enter your user name and password for your Tableau Online account and click Sign In.

Publishing Your Report to Tableau Online

Once you are connected to Tableau Online, you can publish the report from Tableau Desktop to Tableau Online:

  • In the Server menu, select Publish Workbook…
  • In the Publish Workbook to Tableau Server window that is displayed now, first select the Tableau Online Project to publish the workbook in. If you haven't created your own project, only the Standard project will be available here and selected by default.
  • If desired, you may also change the workbook's Name.
  • Under Sheets, select all sheets and/or dashboards that you wish to publish to Meisterplan, by checking or unchecking the boxes to the left of the sheet/dashboard name. Simply select the default All option to publish all sheets and dashboards.
  • Under Permissions, enter Tableau permissions as required. These determine which users may access the report in Tableau Online. With the default setting Same as project, the permissions of the associated Tableau Online project will be inherited; unless you have created your own project, this is the Standard project by default. This will set Tableau's permissions to match the Meisterplan reporting permissions. If you require a user to view a report in Tableau Online, but not in Meisterplan, then these separate permissions should be set here. Please note that the permissions for the workbook can only be inherited from the project when it is first published in Tableau Online. When you publish a workbook again, the permissions that have already been entered for that workbook will be kept with the default setting Set to existing workbook default.
  • Under Data Sources, click Edit. In the Manage Data Sources window that opens now, under Publish Type, select the Embedded in Workbook option. Also, to make sure the password for the data source is embedded, under Authentication, select the Embedded password option.

Step 3: Integrating Your Report in Meisterplan

To integrate your report in Meisterplan, share it in Tableau Online and create a new Weblink report in Meisterplan based on the generated URL.

Sharing Your Report in Tableau Online

  • Use a web browser to log into your Tableau Online account and navigate to the report you want to use.
  • First, click Workbooks, then select the report you just uploaded. This will show a list of all Views and Dashboards that are contained in the report. Open the Dashboard that combines the different views and shows the report in its final form.
  • Click the Share icon in the upper right corner. This will generate a URL to access the report; copy this URL:

Adding Your Report in Meisterplan

  • In the Portfolio Designer view in Meisterplan, open the Reports view via the left hand side sidebar.
  • In the Reports view, open the Add Report menu and select the Weblink report type.
  • Name the report, set Meisterplan permissions according to your preferences and paste the URL in the Address field.

  • Confirm creation of the report by clicking the OK button.

Opening Your Report in Meisterplan

Your report is now available for use in Meisterplan.

  • You may open any Tableau report by selecting it from the Reports view, which is available in the left hand side sidebar.

Important: if you change the password of your reporting database, you will have to re-enter the new password for the data source of each report.

  • Click Open Report to display the selected report:

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