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Mason Mulnix (Member) asked a question.
I've built a dashboard in Tableau desktop that has two data connections:
- Database containing student data from the college I work at (confidential otherwise I'd provide screenshots for context)
- Survey data from a Qualtrics survey
The dashboard acts like a tool for student advisors to "assign" a student's courses to the proper requirement they fulfill.
i.e. the Database (Connection 1) shows a student took the course MATH 100. By using the Qulatrics survey embedded in the dashboard an advisor can assign that course to the 'Math' Category and show the student has 1 course towards satisfying their Math requirement.
The database data (connection 1) is too large to do a live connection, when I publish the workbook to our Tableau Sever the entire data source is on a 24hr refresh. This presents issues as the advisors do not see the changes they make via the Qualtrics survey (connection 2) in real time.
The data from the Qualtrics survey (connection 2) has to be left joined to the data from the database (connection 1) in order for the process to work. I've tried rebuilding the dashboard via Data Blending so that I may upload the workbook with separate databases but I cannot create the calculated fields necessary for the dashboard to work. I've also tried publishing the Qualtrics data to the server and connecting to it to the workbook which ultimately forces me to do data blending.
Is there a way to left join my data while having one data source on an extract refresh and having another connected live?
Thanks!
Unfortunately, the extact/live selection acts on eveything in the data source , not individual connected data sources, which is a pain.
I understand your desire to stay away from blends, because I also hate working with them, however there are times where it's required. The calculated fields do get significantly more difficult across blends, but I've had some success with getting them to do what was necessary while helping someone else out. The result was not the most responsive dashboard in the world, from what I heard, but it worked, and they were stuck with blends for similar reasons you are. The main problems are usually aggregation and granularity.
Personally, I would recommend resigning yourself to a blend in this case, and posting some questions about the calculations you're having difficulty with, possibly with a link to this thread included to explain why you can't do things the normal way.