tap-tableau-server

tap-tableau-server is a Singer tap for Tableau Server, focused (currently) on extracting details embedded inside Workbook files. This includes Datasources, Connections and Relations, as well as retrieving table references from embedded Custom SQL text fields inside Relation entities.

Extracting the specifics of Datasources, Connections, Relations and Table References from each Workbook help answer questions like:

• Which Workbooks depend on which tables in which databases?
• How many Workbooks depend on Excel, CSV or Google Sheets?
• Who's credentials are used for embedded connections, in which Workbooks?

Having answers to all of these questions has helped us with wrangling our Tableau Server instance, which is several years old and has over 1000 Workbooks.

In future, we hope to extend this tap to cover other metadata that is exposed by the Tableau Server API's directly (esp. Published Connections and child objects). PR submission very welcome. Watch this space!

Built with the Meltano SDK for Singer Taps.

Installation

pipx install tap-tableau-server

Configuration

Accepted Config Options

{
  "host": "<tableau server hostname>",
  "username": "<tableau server username>",
  "password": "<tableau server user password>",
  "limit": "<max number of workbooks to fetch per run>",
  "relation_types_exclude": ["<list of tableau workbook relation types to exclude>"],
  "relation_types_include": ["<list of tableau workbook relation types to include>"]
}

Note: The limit configuration is useful for large Tableau Server instances where the number of workbooks to download may be in the 1000's. Setting a limit on the number of workbooks retrieved per run effectively allows you to backfill in fixed increments over several successive tap runs, reducing the load on your server and minimising impact to other users.

A full list of supported settings and capabilities for this tap is available by running:

tap-tableau-server --about

Source Authentication and Authorization

Only workbooks accessible to the user configured above can be extracted. Consider creating a user with the broadest possible access to ensure you collect details from all available Workbooks.

Usage

You can easily run tap-tableau-server by itself or in a pipeline using Meltano.

Executing the Tap Directly

tap-tableau-server --version
tap-tableau-server --help
tap-tableau-server --config CONFIG --discover > ./catalog.json

Developer Resources

Initialize your Development Environment

pipx install poetry
poetry install

Create and Run Tests

Create tests within the tap_tableau_server/tests subfolder and then run:

poetry run pytest

You can also test the tap-tableau-server CLI interface directly using poetry run:

poetry run tap-tableau-server --help

Testing with Meltano

Note: This tap will work in any Singer environment and does not require Meltano. Examples here are for convenience and to streamline end-to-end orchestration scenarios.

Your project comes with a custom meltano.yml project file already created. Open the meltano.yml and follow any "TODO" items listed in the file.

Next, install Meltano (if you haven't already) and any needed plugins:

# Install meltano
pipx install meltano
# Initialize meltano within this directory
cd tap-tableau-server
meltano install

Now you can test and orchestrate using Meltano:

# Test invocation:
meltano invoke tap-tableau-server --version
# OR run a test `elt` pipeline:
meltano elt tap-tableau-server target-jsonl

SDK Dev Guide

See the dev guide for more instructions on how to use the SDK to develop your own taps and targets.