Format at the Workbook Level
Learning Objectives
After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:
- Explain when you should change formatting at the workbook level.
- Change font, color, and text style for your entire workbook.
- Change the line style for your entire workbook.
- Reset your workbook to its default settings.
When to Apply Formatting at the Workbook Level
As you learned during the previous unit, formatting at the workbook level first is a visual best practice. You can choose a style for your fonts, titles, and lines that are consistent throughout your entire workbook. When you apply formatting at the workbook level, you can inadvertently override formatting choices made at the worksheet level, so it’s best to apply workbook-wide formatting before making any worksheet-level changes. Applying your style preferences at this level saves you time.
Change the Font and Title Style for Your Workbook
To access the formatting menu for the workbook level, go to Format then select Workbook. A menu opens on the right side of the screen that allows you to personalize your font, titles, and lines. You can change the font color, size, and type for all worksheets, all tooltips, and all Dashboard and Story titles. You can also choose if you want your text to appear in boldface, italics, or underlined style.
Expand the menus next to each style choice to open the formatting options for each element.
When choosing the color for your font, you can toggle between a light palette and a dark palette. The light palette has lighter, more subdued colors—typically used for shading and background colors. The dark palette has darker, more vibrant colors—typically used for fonts, lines, and other elements you want to pop and grab the readers’ attention.
If none of the colors in the default palette match what you’re looking for, click the plus sign to use a color picker or enter an RGB color code.
Change the Line Formatting for Your Workbook
Lines are used in Tableau visualizations to help add visual detail or separate content. Some lines are built into the view, such as grid lines and zero lines. Other lines help you analyze your data, such as trend lines and reference lines.
You can change the color, thickness, and line type for your lines; for example, you can choose to have solid, dashed, or dotted lines on your viz. To format lines, click the menu next to the line you wish to format, and then choose the formatting that will help you tell your story with data.
Reset Your Workbook to Default Formatting
If you'd like to reset all settings back to the default settings, click Reset to Defaults at the bottom of the Workbook formatting pane.
Tip: If you see a gray circle next to an element, it means formatting has been applied. Click the gray circle to reset the formatting for that element.
After you apply your formatting choices at the workbook level, you can move on to the worksheet level. Learn how to do that in the next unit.