MS SharePoint / SQL vs. Tableau Desktop

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
MS SharePoint / SQL
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
MS SharePoint / SQL refers to Microsoft Sharepoint, a web-based collaborative platform, being used in tandem with Microsoft SQL Server to provide business intelligence analytics and reporting. They can provide BI content such as data connections, reports, scorecards, dashboards, and more.N/A
Tableau Desktop
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Tableau Desktop is a data visualization product from Tableau. It connects to a variety of data sources for combining disparate data sources without coding. It provides tools for discovering patterns and insights, data calculations, forecasts, and statistical summaries and visual storytelling.
$75
per month per user
Pricing
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Tableau
$75
per month per user
Tableau Enterprise
$115
per month per user
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsAll pricing plans are billed annually.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Considered Both Products
MS SharePoint / SQL
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
1. Cost affective as it comes with MS 365 Tenant 2. Natively interactive with tools such MS 365 Dynamics ERP, Power Platform etc
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Ease of use being the biggest benefit, speed and availability are right there behind ease of use.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
SharePoint is more reliable in terms of data storage, security, and accessibility by only required users compared to ClickUp. Also, SharePoint is easier to learn and use for any user, as tutorials are easily available online. Also, SharePoint is a product of Microsoft, which …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Simple: MS Sharepoint/SQL is the best and robust databases motor now are incorporating some features in order to improve users and DB admins experience.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
The user interface and search elements are much better than our outgoing data storage method.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Box is a content storing portal where you can host and share documents/files to others. But it does not have [Sharepoint's] capabilities like... versions, automation, email approvals, etc. And Microsoft Exchange is a mailing database that can be used for exchanging data using …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Has better support than MySQL and more developers are familiar with it. Oracle syntax is more cumbersome and less developers are experienced these days with Oracle.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
I have heard that the one that comes close is a tool called Apex. Some of the leading companies are using it instead of SQL.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
If you are looking for a document management and collaboration tool to use as a web portal that comes with SQL data base and easy to manage and something you can learn very quick, look no further than SharePoint but if you need a pure database then this is not for you.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
We use MS SQL more just because of how widely it's used and how popular it is. It's easier to install, maintain, and support compared to the other ones we've tried.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
At the time of the two large projects, SharePoint was the enterprise solution so we were required to use that. We have since lobbied the enterprise teams to review and consider Atlassian confluence and were successful. Confluence is cheaper than Sharepoint which is why we …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
At its core, MS SharePoint (with SQL) is for managing document-based content. It falls just short of being a best in class records manager (it does offer some features for this though), and it isn't the easiest to solution to make great looking modern and engaging web sites. …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
We looked at Google Drive but it didn't have the API and integration that SharePoint has with 3rd party software providers. Also, Google Drive has basic functionality compared to MS SharePoint and how you can customize and build-out.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
I haven't used any other products that compete with it. I started my career at Microsoft and the two subsequent locations have also been Microsoft shops.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Dropbox is a user-friendly product, but Sharepoint is a native Microsoft product that can be implemented into any Microsoft products, which are used mostly in our environment. Finding solutions on the internet is much easier, as it is used commonly by other organizations as …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
I am not familiar with any other products similar to SharePoint, so I am unable to compare.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Mostly, we are a Microsoft shop, and SharePoint and SQL integrate with our other applications. They're easy to use, and not too hard to manage.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
I have used both Google Drive and Zoho Docs which seem similar to MS SharePoint. The main differences I noticed as a user is that the user interfaces in both Google Drive and Zoho Docs were much more intuitive and they were much easier to navigate than MS SharePoint. There …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
We had staff resources able to create, configure, and mange our sharepoint environment, so it made sense for us and gave us greater flexibility than these turnkey solutions. Certainly each solution has its merits and each are completely different price points. We already had …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Most of the applications used within our company have a SharePoint back end therefore I have not used anything other than SharePoint.
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
We evaluated Atlassian Confluence and compared it to our current SharePoint implementation. We felt that the two products were quite similar in the user experience but we chose to keep our SharePoint farms up and running. This was mainly due to the cost of switching and the …
Chose MS SharePoint / SQL
Actually i didnt work with other than ms sharepoint so i cant say how it is stand for others
Tableau Desktop
Chose Tableau Desktop
Both power bi and Tableau Desktop has its own pros and cons. Microsoft power bi is best to work with Microsoft products. however for fast connection with diverse range of integration with data sources Tableau Desktop is best. if you are cost sensitive power bi is best option …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau is more flexible than these - I liked Qlikview old version a lot but have not used the Qlik Sense etc new ones. Tableau user logic is harder to understand than Looker Studio. However it's more trust worthy. Connecting internet sources to Tableau Desktop is much harder. …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop is older and just better overall. It has more capabilities and is more useful to have. I don't think you could have Alteryx as a standalone product like you can with Tableau Desktop. You'd want another bi tool.
Chose Tableau Desktop
We used to use products from the Google family in parallel. After migrating to GA4, we use Tableau much more.
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop has a more easy to use drag and drop interface and is easier to learn. It also allows greater customization of charts than Power BI. However, Tableau Desktop costs more than Power BI which is bundled into our Microsoft contract at no additional charge. Power BI …
Chose Tableau Desktop
The visualizations are far and away more powerful and it is more user friendly than Power BI. It would take 3-4 times as long to create the types of reports in Excel that I can create in Tableau Desktop and there are a slew of ways I can present the data in Tableau Desktop that …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Can handle large amounts of data
Chose Tableau Desktop
It has a better user interface compared to Microsoft Power BI. The Tableau integration process is quite simple and clear with the third-party application whereas Power BI is not easily integrated with other tools and requires a complex process to follow for integration. DAX …
Chose Tableau Desktop
When it comes to pricing, Tableau is kinda expensive but worth it as it has more features, not just features but really useful features that make our work easier especially as a project manager I need to pull up data almost every day in our meetings, and I find Tableau useful …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau can create visually attractive customizable dashboards than can quickly by drag-drop while in power bi we can create simple dashboard. Power bi support lesser data source while in Tableau there is a lot of options
When we talk about data handling tableau is a clear …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop is clearly one of the best in the business. It has incredible capabilities, and many features are extremely useful. The intuitiveness of the dashboards and the graphical nature of the visualizations are widely used features and super helpful. One of the other …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop provides some state of the art feature and capabilities that are just awesome. Its support, online blog, and tutorials are better than its competitors. That was the best selling point for me.
Chose Tableau Desktop
With Tableau Desktop, it's easy to create a report in the context quickly. It allows for the seamless management of the data sources, which is convenient for the data users. Because it is simple to use, it is
Chose Tableau Desktop
It does have a lot of potential when using Microsoft other technologies - in integration/Embedded, Visuals and connectivity to data sources. Advanced analytics is also smooth when working on python/r scripts. Automated insights are better in Tableau/Alphaa AI. NLG/NLQ - …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau offers a lot of educational content, and for a limited time, we were able to use paid educational content for free, so we are very satisfied.
Chose Tableau Desktop
For complex data visualization, Tableau Desktop shines. Even though it uses highly granular databases, it has a powerful engine that can process large amounts of data quickly and produce high-quality charts. It has the broadest range of APIs and is extremely simple. The …
Chose Tableau Desktop
We decided to use Tableau Desktop as that's fairly standard in the industry, it is being taught in college, and is widely known. Tableau Desktop is nice, but in my opinion, it is VERY expensive. Unless you are really making money off of decisions, then your ROI is going to be …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Using Tableau Desktop, we have found it the most actionable and user-friendly application ever. It has the broadest range of APIs and is exceptionally user-friendly. It can handle a large amount of data and produce smooth charts quickly. For data geeks, this is the ideal stack.
Chose Tableau Desktop
When compared to Power BI, Tableau has a more flexible deployment. You can install the desktop version without having to install the SQL server. Tableau got you covered end-to-end — from collaboration, analytics, content discovery, data prep & access, down to deployment. …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop is preferred over other BI software because it allows for more data visualization, storytelling, and dashboards. Microsoft Power BI may be a better option if you need to perform data modeling, however. Tableau Desktop is an excellent tool for nearly all other …
Chose Tableau Desktop
We preferred Tableau over Power BI due to its user-friendly interface and interactive GUI. Since we work with large datasets, we observed that Power BI can deal with only a limited amount of data when compared to Tableau which creates complex visualizations in a time-efficient …
Chose Tableau Desktop
Tableau Desktop is the most user-friendly and actionable application we have used in comparison to others. It has the best API connection potential along with easy start-up. They seem to always be updating the platform to solve newer problems which help keep my company up to …
Chose Tableau Desktop
We also use Power BI for small projects and teams that can't afford to pay for Tableau licenses. Tableau has more features and is more robust compared to Power BI. They also provide better and faster support compared to Microsoft. It is the standard visualization tool, but …
Chose Tableau Desktop
For databases or types of data that have high granularity and details, Tableau Desktop is better to plot and help visualize every detailed behavior with a great performance. It's engine can process a massive amount of data and generate a smooth chart without spending too much …
Features
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
7.7
Ratings
6% below category average
Tableau Desktop
8.3
Ratings
2% above category average
Pixel Perfect reports8.70 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Customizable dashboards7.00 Ratings8.40 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates7.30 Ratings7.80 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
8.2
Ratings
2% above category average
Tableau Desktop
8.7
Ratings
8% above category average
Drill-down analysis7.80 Ratings8.60 Ratings
Formatting capabilities8.30 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages8.00 Ratings7.70 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration8.60 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
8.9
Ratings
7% above category average
Tableau Desktop
8.1
Ratings
3% below category average
Publish to Web8.70 Ratings7.30 Ratings
Publish to PDF9.40 Ratings7.90 Ratings
Report Versioning8.30 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling9.00 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Delivery to Remote Servers9.00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
8.6
Ratings
8% above category average
Tableau Desktop
8.4
Ratings
5% above category average
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)8.70 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization8.00 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Predictive Analytics9.30 Ratings8.60 Ratings
Pattern Recognition and Data Mining8.40 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
8.2
Ratings
3% below category average
Tableau Desktop
8.7
Ratings
3% above category average
Multi-User Support (named login)7.90 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model8.10 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)8.20 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control7.80 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)8.70 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
9.4
Ratings
19% above category average
Tableau Desktop
8.0
Ratings
3% above category average
Responsive Design for Web Access9.40 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Mobile Application9.40 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile8.70 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Product A and Product B
MS SharePoint / SQL
8.8
Ratings
12% above category average
Tableau Desktop
9.0
Ratings
14% above category average
REST API9.30 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Javascript API9.30 Ratings9.00 Ratings
iFrames9.00 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Java API9.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Themeable User Interface (UI)8.00 Ratings8.40 Ratings
Customizable Platform (Open Source)8.00 Ratings8.40 Ratings
Best Alternatives
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Small Businesses
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Score 9.1 out of 10
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Score 9.1 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
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Score 10.0 out of 10
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Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
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Score 9.9 out of 10
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Score 9.9 out of 10
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User Ratings
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Likelihood to Recommend
8.8
(0 ratings)
8.7
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.8
(0 ratings)
8.9
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.9
(0 ratings)
8.6
(0 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
6.1
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.8
(0 ratings)
7.0
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.4
(0 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
7.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
8.1
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
MS SharePoint / SQLTableau Desktop
Likelihood to Recommend
As I mentioned in my previous answers, MS SharePoint is very useful as a shared drive for the organization and is very easy to manage. It also helps us import data from SharePoint directly into PowerBI for creating reports. According to my understanding, only share link features should be improved.
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The best scenario is definitely to collect data from several sources and create dedicated dashboards for specific recipients. However, I miss the possibility of explaining these reports in more detail. Sometimes, we order a report, and after half a year, we don't remember the meaning of some data (I know it's our fault as an organization, but the tool could force better practices).
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Pros
  • Flexible - able to make any changes we would like vs traditional service desk system.
  • ROI - We were already using SharePoint for internal intranet, so we are simply getting more use out of licensing we had already committed to.
  • Easy to use for end users.
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  • The Visualizations graphics are really good and the color options help in designing attractive charts. They help to convey more information and can be made interactive.
  • You can add filters with offer you to plug and play with values and understand different outcomes.
  • You can drag and drop options while creating charts and dashboards. also it is a very fluid layout.
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Cons
  • It is hard to setup and nightmare
  • It requires a of infrastructure, thus it could be costly because of requirement and licensing required for everything to run smoothly
  • If it is not setup and organized properly from the beginning it could be maintenance nightmare
  • It is hard to have "test" environment to do patches or similar
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  • Formatting the data to work correctly in graphical presentations can be time consuming
  • Daily data extracts can run slowly depending on how much data is required and the source of the data
  • The desktop version is required for advanced functionality, editing on [the] Tableau server allows only limited features
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Likelihood to Renew
This was a long-term buy-in from a corporate perspective, to remain in the SharePoint space. Migration is certainly possible, which is good for planning and having options further out. At this point, the only planned migration is to eventually move the architecture up to SharePoint/SQL 2013. At that point, we will be able to leverage some greater efficiencies, some enhanced content design and management features, and some more current social features. It is well worth a full consideration in any shop looking at a new implementation of or migration to SharePoint (although you will probably be considering 2013 versions or beyond in those discussions), but the platform should be a strong competitor to any alternatives. Realizing the capability of a fully-branded and customized website was not part of the original choice for the architecture at Lincoln, but seeing it implemented and functioning now with this capacity far beyond original expectations has certainly cemented plans to continue using it.
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Because right now its the best option out there (disclosure: I haven't used Qlikview or some of the other direct competitors of Tableau). The big investment is in Tableau Server not desktop. For the cost of the license of Tableau desktop, its a pretty good deal. You can hook it up to pretty much any data source easily. You can easily share the visualizations with your team/colleagues easily. Tableau Desktop is generally easy to use for business users. But the more advanced stuff is better suited for a analyst or someone with a IT/CS background.
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Usability
I gave this rating due to MS SharePoint being a big help with our userbase. We have a lot of users that are just old enough to not have much technical skills or they have been in this industry long enough to where they haven't really needed to utilize much technology. MS SharePoint helped us move beyond that barrier without too many bumps and bruises.
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Tableau Desktop has proven to be a lifesaver in many situations. Once we've completed the initial setup, it's simple to use. It has all of the features we need to quickly and efficiently synthesize our data. Tableau Desktop has advanced capabilities to improve our company's data structure and enable self-service for our employees.
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Reliability and Availability
No answers on this topic
When used as a stand-alone tool, Tableau Desktop has unlimited uptime, which is always nice. When used in conjunction with Tableau Server, this tool has as much uptime as your server admins are willing to give it. All in all, I've never had an issue with Tableau's availability.
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Performance
No answers on this topic
Tableau Desktop's performance is solid. You can really dig into a large dataset in the form of a spreadsheet, and it exhibits similarly good performance when accessing a moderately sized Oracle database. I noticed that with Tableau Desktop 9.3, the performance using a spreadsheet started to slow around 75K rows by about 60 columns. This was easily remedied by creating an extract and pushing it to Tableau Server, where performance went to lightning fast
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Support Rating
I've only had to call in to support on one occasion but they were able to work though our issue and find a solution that did fully resolve the issue in a timely manner. I can't always say the same about support from other companies so it was a refreshing change to have support that did help.
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The Tableau Desktop's support team has been very helpful and tend to response very quickly. After all you have paid very premium price for the product and it goes to the services. This makes using the tool much easier for these who doesn't have such experience to get help quickly.
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In-Person Training
No answers on this topic
It is admittedly hard to train a group of people with disparate levels of ability coming in, but the software is so easy to use that this is not a huge problem; anyone who can follow simple instructions can catch up pretty quickly.
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Online Training
No answers on this topic
I think the training was good overall, but it was maybe stating the obvious things that a tech savvy young engineer would be able to pick up themselves too. However, the example work books were good and Tableau web community has helped me with many problems
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Implementation Rating
Mo major insight regarding the implementation if very well documented for standard products.
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Time needs to be spent ahead of implementation to make sure data sources are set up and ready. Consultants need to understand the data sources and the goals before setting foot on-site. Installation is easy, learning to use it takes time. The training resources available are great.
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Alternatives Considered
At the time of the two large projects, SharePoint was the enterprise solution so we were required to use that. We have since lobbied the enterprise teams to review and consider Atlassian Confluence and were successful. Confluence is cheaper than Sharepoint which is why we wanted to bring that in. The enterprise has now made Confluence an enterprise solution as an alternative to SharePoint. After using both I think SharePoint has many more add-ins than Confluence. It has much more customization ability than Confluence. SharePoint is not good for mobile readiness. Confluence is so there is a difference that might lead you to Confluence over SharePoint. I would also say that SharePoint is very document-centric and that Confluence has better KM than SharePoint does. even with the use of SQL Server. We were told that we could not use Google Drive even though it had features we liked.
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Tableau Desktop is clearly one of the best in the business. It has incredible capabilities, and many features are extremely useful. The intuitiveness of the dashboards and the graphical nature of the visualizations are widely used features and super helpful. One of the other benefits is that both programmers and non-programmers can equally explore and create their own opportunities, and seamless integration is possible.
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Scalability
No answers on this topic
Tableau Desktop's scaleability is really limited to the scale of your back-end data systems. If you want to pull down an extract and work quickly in-memory, in my application it scaled to a few tens of millions of rows using the in-memory engine. But it's really only limited by your back-end data store if you have or are willing to invest in an optimized SQL store or purpose-built query engine like Veritca or Netezza or something similar.
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Return on Investment
  • ROI for ms SharePoint/SQL considering that is the best database engine with excellent features that help you to have all information in your hand.
  • Something negative could be license format.
  • These are the best relational databases in the market with powerful features that complement your system.
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  • Easy to share and manage viewer access on a different level to help identify fraud.
  • Faster report generation, increased revenue, better decision-making, and data storytelling.
  • One-click access to business health and the ability to build/maintain more effective and efficient reports.
  • It's easy to share and even manage access to viewers on a different level, and reports are done in a more visual and storytelling manner.
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ScreenShots