John,

The default maps are provided by Urban Mapping (see http://urbanmapping.com/).  Tableau built their service into the software.  Urban Mapping also supplies the data layers.  It's a very powerful feature, but as you noted, some of the options are more limited such as the color legend versus the standard Tableau color legend.

Joshua

That data is coming from Urban Mapping, so the legend and aggregation can't be changed in Tableau. But Urban Mapping did create a HackYourMap site, to give you some control over what you're interested in. In this FAQ there is a section on Heat Maps that might work for you. Have fun.

--Shawn

John I don't have an answer for the changing the "break-points" yet, but I can help you get the colors to separate better. Michael created a preference file which includes several dozen color palettes to choose from. Most of them will have more distinct colors so they are easier to pick out:

Put the attached preferences file in you My Tableau Repository (Beta) directory and you'll have access to Michael's color palettes.

--Shawn

John,

On top of Shawn said i would like to inform you that for maps professor Cynthia Brewer has created an awesome resource related to colors and color palette.

• colorbrewer2.org
• RGB specs for each ColorBrewer scheme as XLS file http://www.personal.psu.edu/cab38/ColorBrewer/ColorBrewer_RGB.html

A lot of brewer palettes are included by hand on .tps file Shawn has invited to use.

Good luck and design stunning colored maps!

Regards,

Cristian.

Oops! Cristian is right, I should have given credit where credit is due. Michael did credit the heck out of Cynthia when posting his original file, and I should have linked to his post, instead of posting the file -- but can I use the excuse that I'm soooo tired of doing the search/link/test dance. Well I guess I don't really care if I get your permission; I'm just flat tired of the difficulty of creating good content here in this replay box with its flawed tool set.

But thanks for the assist Cristian.

--Shawn

Shawn,

It's OK, everybody is busy and tired.

Keep up the nice work for community of Tableau users! You are in top 5% of hard working users. I appreciate you very much.

Regards,

Cristian.