Jim Dehner 

 Tableau Visionary and Ambassador

Tableau How to’s,  Use Cases, and Forums Questions

Hey #DataFam

Let’s Talk

Open for

Post Links

A frequent user question is how to find the Top N and then group and total all the remaining items into a single category "Other"

 

 

A common problem with many business applications – determining the Top N can be easily done in several ways.  (Presented on VizConnect – see the recording at Link to Recording)

1 The Top N filter

Just apply a Top N filter to the dimension

 

 

A more typical question adds some complexity where the user wants to see the Top N across multiple dimensions which can be solved using Index() or Rank() 

 
2 The Index() solution
 
Index() is based on the position of the record in the data table so start by sorting the data:
 

 

Add the Index() (note can be hidden)
 

 

and finally, add a filter set to N
 

 

It works well but there is a need to pre-sort the data and when there are multiple dimensions you will need to determine which column to use in the sort: 

 

3 The Rank solution

An alternative is to use a ranking based on either a measure or a LOD. All forms of Rank are table calculations and look something like this:

RANK_UNIQUE(sum([Sales]),'desc')

and each segment can be treated independently without presorting the data:

 

 

4 Top N and Other

Users often want to see the Top N individually and group the remaining as "Other".  It requires a complex solution that combines both LOD's, Table Calculation, the use of Show/Hide filters, and a hack 

Start with a LOD to find the Top N and "Other" based on sub category and region (Note I am using Include to support drilling down into the Region Hierarchy) :

{ INCLUDE  [Region],[Category]:sum([Sales])}

and then Rank the LOD 

rank(sum([6 lod sales region subcat]),'desc')

to start building a data table for the viz like this 

 

 

 

for flexibility, I added a parameter to set the N level for the Top N and created this T/F calculation

[6 rank for lod sub reg]<=[N to top N]

and used this to add a Label to the "Other" group

if [6 rank tf ] then attr([Sub-Category]) else "Other" end

 the data table now looks like this:

 

 

use a table calculation to total the "Other" 

window_sum(if [6 subcat and other label]="Other" then sum([6 lod sales region subcat]) end)

and restart every Region places the Other Total on all subcategories, not in the Top N – after sorting the table now looks like this

 

 

 

Now the hack, we only want to see each of the Top N subcategories and 1 of the subcategories labeled "Other"  in each region  – That is done with a show hide filter:

if [6 rank for lod sub reg]<=[N to top N]+1 then "show" else "hide" end

After applying the filter and hiding the real subcategory labels the data table is complete

 

 

like a bar chart the results look like this

 


 

5 Drill down in Hierarchy

One advantage of using the Include LOD is that it supports drill into the hierarchy finding the Top N at subsequently lower levels

 
the LOD expression used here was 
 
{ INCLUDE  [Region],[Category]:sum([Sales])}
 
which will support drilling down from Region to the State level – at the Region level and filtered for Central the bar chart looks like this 
 
 

 

Drilling down in the Region hierarchy to the State level will return the Top N and Other unique to each state
 
 

 

Hope this helps the next time you need to find the Top N and group the Other

 

The examples used here, and a few others,  can be downloaded at workbook here

Enjoy

Jim 

 

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *