Hi Philip,

I took 2 classes last year as bookends at the Tableau Conference.  1 day intensives is what I would call them.  Very good, I liked the classroom environment and the price was decent.

The class at the start of the conference was great, it was harder to stay upright in the class at the end of the conference, not because of the class, just because there wasn't much downtime during the conference so I was tired.

I'm hoping to try a virtual class at the end of the month, I don't see anything local offered at the moment.

I looked at the online certification test video, I recommend watching that if you haven't.  It gave me a really good idea of what taking the test at home/work would be like.  I think I prefer to take the test at conference, or in classroom.

Looking forward to hearing other people's experiences.

Susan

Philip,

I'm not aware of specific courses offered in San Diego that are oriented specifically around Tableau Certification, but I would recommend attending the Tableau Conference later this year in Las Vegas.  As mentioned by Susan, they offer training workshops and there are a number of other opportunities at the conference to attend hands-on breakout sessions where Tableau provides laptops.  If you took the formal workshops as well as attending as many of the hands-on sessions as possible, you would be well on your way to having the skills needed for certification.  As an added benefit, there are many other learning opportunities at the conference such as deep-dive sessions, tips and tricks sessions, and Tableau Doctor sessions.

Here is a link to the learning section of this year's conference:

Learn | Tableau Conference 2017

Best of luck with your training!

Let's to the San Diego Tableau Users Group training series again!  I loved it and I wouldn't mind sharing what I know about AWS and Tableau...

Matt Shoemaker

I love AWS and Tableau even more now since you can publish from Tableau Public to Tableau Server.

https://www.tableau.com/products/desktop?utm_campaign=Tableau%20Public%20-%20Subscription%20Announcement%20-%20en-US%20-%202017-05-04&utm_medium=Email&utm_source=Eloqua&domain=gmail.com&eid=CTBLS000006286163&elqTrackId=c04fe04268654eefb6418d05c2526b33&elq=fb6e3876bfd241e8849d88d0325647cb&elqaid=22406&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=25103

Philip,

Here is a link to a number of Knowledge base videos provided by Tableau.  I think if you followed along with these videos you would have 90% of what you need to pass the desktop certification.  The other 10% would come from experience as you apply the principles you learned there to other vizzes.

   Short Video Tutorials in our Knowledge Base Articles

  To practice and get more variety, you could follow along with the examples provided in these excellent videos listed below.  Note that where you'll need more practice to gain proficiency will be in the more advanced topics such as table calculations, level-of-detail calculations, and order of operations.

    Andy Kriebel - YouTube

    Tips and Tricks from a Tableau Jedi - YouTube

    50 Tips in 50 Minutes Tableau Customer Conference 2016 - YouTube

  Best of luck with your training and feel free to bring any of your questions or topics to the user group meeting and we'll be happy to cover it.