Create Maximize & Minimize Options in Tableau

For most of us, ever since we started using a computer, we could maximize a window to make it full screen and then minimize that window.  This is so common and so useful, why not do it in Tableau?  This short blog post will feature a technique that I commonly use at work and that I recently used in my Avoid the Current Month Drop-Off viz.  What I am referring to is creating maximize and minimize windows in Tableau.

If you haven’t seen the viz (and blog post), I’d recommend to check it out and give the maximize and minimize options a try.  I’ve also included an animated gif below so that you can see it in action:

Creating this functionality is very simple.  First, create a new dashboard that contains only the sheet you want to show maximized (in the aforementioned viz, I wanted to keep headers, so I just duplicated my main dashboard and removed the unwanted sheets).  Next, on your main dashboard, add a navigation button to the view.  I used a “pop-out” icon I found on The Noun Project.  Set that navigation button to go to the new dashboard you just created (the one with the single sheet).  Now go to that new dashboard and add a navigation button to the view.  This time it will be a minimize icon (I used a “pop-in” icon from The Noun Project).  Set that button to navigate back to the main dashboard. 

You should replicate this process for as many charts that you wish you maximize and minimize.  When finished, a user can click any button on the main dashboard to be taken to a new dashboard containing only that sheet.  The user may not even realize they are being taken to a new dashboard – it just looks like the normal maximize and minimize options they are accustomed to.

Please note that you could theoretically do this using collapsible containers.  However, you can only show a sheet on a dashboard one time.  So using collapsible containers would require that you duplicate the sheet.  I personally do not like duplicating worksheets as any time a change needs to be made to that sheet, it has to be made twice…if you even remember to do it on both of them.  Duplicating dashboards on the other hand is, in my opinion, less problematic. 

Anyway, that’s all there is to it…duplicate the dashboard, show one chart, add a button to the main dashboard that goes to the new dashboard, and add a button to the new dashboard that goes to the main one.  That’s all!  Now you have a nice interface that allows your users to get a better look and each chart. 

Thanks for reading and as always, please feel free to reach out if you have any comments or questions.  Thanks!

Kevin Flerlage, June 8, 2020

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