KNOWLEDGE BASE

Data in a Tableau Server View is Out of Date


Published: 11 Apr 2013
Last Modified Date: 24 Aug 2022

Issue

Data shown in a Tableau Server view is not the most recent data.

Environment

Tableau Server

Resolution

Pre-TSM Versions of Tableau Server (2018.1.x and earlier)

Show Most Recent Data for All Views

To show the most recent data for all Tableau Server views, change the cache settings to Balanced or Refresh more often.
  1. On the computer running Tableau Server, navigate to the following location to stop the server: 
    • All Programs > Tableau Server x.x > Stop Tableau Server on the Windows Start menu.
  2. Select Configure Tableau Server on the Windows Start menu.
  3. If you are using an Active Directory account for the server’s Run As User account, enter its password on the General tab.
  4. On the Data Connections tab, select Balanced or Refresh more often.
  5. Click OK.
  6. Start the server by selecting:
    •  All Programs > Tableau Server x.x > Start Tableau Server on the Windows Start menu.

TSM Versions of Tableau Server (2018.2 and later)

Show Most Recent Data for All Views

  1. Run this command:

    tsm data-access caching set -r <value>

    Where <value> is one of these options:

    • low or empty string (""). This is the default value and indicates that Tableau Server should configure cache and always use cached data when available.
    • value. Where "<value>" specifies the maximum number of minutes data should be cached.
    • always or 0 (zero). These values indicates that Tableau Server should always get the latest data and that the cache should be refreshed each time a page is reloaded.

2. Apply changes with the tsm pending-changes apply command. This will restart Tableau Server.

All versions of Tableau Server

Show the Most Recent Data for a Specific View

To show the most recent data on specific views, use one of the following options:

  • Open the view, and then click Refresh Data. For more information, see Refresh Data in Tableau Help. 
  • Append ?:refresh=y to URL of the view. For example: http://servername/views/workbookname/dashboard1?:refresh=y 

Cause

This behavior is expected when caching is set to Refresh less often. The following is a further explanation of possible causes for this issue:
  • When a view published to Tableau Server has a live connection to a database, the data that is queried is stored in a cache. Subsequent visits pull the data from this cache if it is available. In addition, interaction with a view from an extract causes the VizQL session to be cached. It is possible that reopening the view may pull an older version of the view from the VizQL cache.
  • When a view published to Tableau Server connects to an extract, interaction with the view causes the VizQL session to be cached. Reopening the view might pull an older version of the view from the VizQL cache.
  • When Refresh less often is selected, VizQL may continue to use the cache for up to 12 hours.
  • Each process has its own cache stored in RAM, which is why clicking Refresh Data does not refresh data for every user. Different user sessions are handled by different VizQL processes, and Refresh Data only removes the cache of the current process.
  • In addition to the caching the view, VizQL also caches database query results. As a result, if one workbook sends the same query to the same database, VizQL is able to reuse data from cache.

Additional Information

In the Tableau Server Configuration window, use the Data Connections tab to configure caching and specify how you want to handle initial SQL statements from data sources.


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