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Use Ad-Hoc Groups to Categorize

In Tableau v3.0 or later, you can combine several dimension members into a single member using ad-hoc groups. For example, if you are working with a field that contains thousands of products, you can use ad-hoc groups to combine those products into higher level categories. This feature is really useful when you want to highlight specific members of a dimension such as a subset of products.

Here's how it works.

The view below shows the Sales vs. Profits for many different products. The data has been disaggregated to show each record in the database. Refer to Aggregating and Disaggregating Data to learn more.
A view showing the sales vs. profit for many different products.
Notice that the view is color encoded by product. However, there are so many products that it is hard to see what is actually going on.
Now, let's say you were really only interested in comparing groups of products. You can use an ad-hoc group to combine all products of interest into one group and everything else into another.

To create an ad-hoc group:

1. Right-click the field in the Data window whose members you want to combine (in this case, Product Category 2) and select Create Ad-Hoc Group.
Right-click the field in the Data window and select Create Ad-Hoc Group.
2. In the Create Ad-Hoc Group dialog box, type a name for the field. For this example, name the field Product Highlight.
Type a name for the grouped field.
3. Select the members that you want to highlight and click Group.
Select the members you want to highlight and click Group.
Note: There are several different ways to find and select members in the Ad-Hoc Groups dialog box. To learn more about using the Ad-Hoc Groups dialog box, search for Groups in the online help.
4. Select the Include 'Other' check box.
Select the Include Other checkbox.
5. When finished, click OK.
The new group field displays in the Data window marked with a paper clip icon. If you drag the new group field onto the Color shelf, the view is then encoded with two colors: one for the products of interest and one for the other products. You can make the highlighted products stand out even more by double-clicking the color legend and changing the other field to gray.
The new view now uses the group field on to color encode the view and highlight specific products.
 

To Learn More

  • Learn more about Ad-Hoc Groups by searching for Groups in the Tableau Online Help.
  • Contact Tableau Technical Support at: (206) 633 3400 x2
  • Learn this trick and many more at the Tips and Tricks index. Don't forget to bookmark it.