On the 11th and 12th of November of this year a complete new Tableau event was held in the center of London: DataFam 2024.
From TCEU & Vizit to DataFam
In 2018 and 2019 we still had the ‘original’ Tableau Conference Europe in London and Berlin. A couple of thousands Tableau enthusiasts gathered on these conferences, which were very much like a ‘light’ Tableau Conference.
Due to Corona no events were organized in 2020 and ’21, but in ’22 a small conference-like event was held in London: Vizit London, and a year later Vizit Berlin. These small events were a real success, with ‘conference-like’ break out sessions, meetups and keynotes.
What was so special about these events? They were not organized by Tableau, but by the Tableau Community (with some support by sponsors). (And they were free.)
Earlier this year the rumors started: still no TC Europe, but a larger-than-Vizit event, organized by Tableau: Datafam!
Datafam 2024
Two days packed with sessions, a real – and good – keynote, an ‘Iron Viz’ like battle, and of course: many, many Tableau enthusiasts, in Convene Sancroft next to St Paul’s Cathedral, London.
The keynote from Nathalie Nahai about AI was inspiring, and the DataFam Slam was in my opinion great: a tips and tricks competition between two teams with Tableau employees on one side, and Datafam members on the other.
A different kind of battle is ‘Tableau True to the Core’ where anybody could ask any question to the leaders of Tableau, including CEO Ryan Aytay. Not my favorite kind of session since the usual complains come along (features, cost, competition, …), and the setup can be better, but I think it take a lot of courage of the leaders to enable such a session.
Much more fun: Hands-on training for APIs and extensions, challenges, and many break out sessions. I attended breakout sessions on VizQL Data Service (cool stuff to use Tableau data in other applications), Parameter Actions, a TUG leaders meetup, Color Theory in Tableau, Tremendous Tableau Tips.
And I presented one myself (just like last year at Vizit Berlin)!
Deep Cleaning dashboards
This year prepared a session on cleaning up dashboards. Starting from an ‘ok’ but not very pretty dashboard we took a look at cleaning up bar-charts, line charts, a twist on pie-charts, BANs, labeling, images, parameters, better use of color, legends, improving tables, and adding titles on more ‘logical’ locations in your dashboard.
All the deep-cleaning topics will get their own blog post very soon!
I really enjoyed presenting the session – and I got some really nice feedback afterwards.
Video Impressions
My lovely wife Antonette made some really, really great video impressions of the events:
Sunday (Data & Women)
Monday
Tuesday
One of the best things of Tableau events – and the Community in general – are the people. The diversity of people is great (industries, nationalities, experience, jobs, …). And if you are just a bit involved into the community you know many people by name. As a Tableau Forum Ambassador I know quite some people, but many of them I have seen only in an online Tableau meeting, or not at all. Therefor the organized and spontaneous meetups are so great: Data + Women, Datadev, TUG leaders, Forum Ambassadors, and partner events are a nice way to meet these community members, and get acquainted with new ones.
Datafam 2025
The first Datafam event in the world was a great success, and I really do hope a Datafam 2025 (or TCE25, or…) will be the next chapter. Maybe a little bigger, but with the same viben and energy as Datafam 2024!
