Welcome to the DataDev Quest Beginner Challenge for November 2025! This challenge is designed to teach you how to use Tableau MCP and Tableau Developer Sandbox to query the Sample – Superstore Data Source using Claude Desktop.

Challenge Overview

Objective:

Familiarize yourself with Tableau MCP, install, and ask an AI question using Claude Desktop.

Why this challenge?

Tableau MCP is a suite of developer primitives, including tools, resources, and prompts that make it easier for developers to build AI applications that integrate with Tableau.

Learning Goals

• Get your Tableau Developer Sandbox
• Configure Personal Access Token (PAT)
• Install and configure Tableau MCP
• Execute Tableau MCP Server
• Write prompts using Claud Desktop through Superstore Data Source

Submission Guidelines

• Source Code: Publish your project publicly in your GitHub profile
• Add README: This includes setup instructions and describes how to run the program.
• Video of Solution: Include a video of your solution in the README file. You can publish it on YouTube and embed the iframe, or save the video file in the repository’s root directory.
• Comments: Ensure your code is well-commented.
• Submission: Submit your challenge in the following **forms**

Additional Resources

• Tableau MCP Documentation
• Tableau MCP Repository
• Model Context Protocol Documentation
• Steps to install Tableau MCP from the documentation
• Optional Environment variables for JSON config file
• Tableau Slack DataDev Channel #tableau-ai-solutions
• Run Tableau MCP in Claude Desktop – video by Will Sutton
• Who’s down With M.C.P.? by Jhosua Vijeh

Before start

For this Challenge, you will need to:

• Install Node.js version 22.7.5 or later
• Configure Tableau MCP using the link
• Install Claude Desktop
• Create or use an account for Claude

I suggest you check the previous, beginner, and intermediate challenges on VizQL Data Services (VDS) for references on how this technology works in the backend. Also, there is a potential risk of sharing data with third parties. I recommend you check the terms of service before using enterprise data.

Getting Started

The first step is to get and set up your Tableau Developer Sandbox. My Medium Post provides a step-by-step guide to configuring it.

1. Explore your Tableau Cloud Site

In your Tableau Cloud Site, go to Explore

and open the Folder with the name Samples:

2. Be familiar with Superstore Datasource

In the folder Samples, click on Superstore Datasource and create a new Workbook Using This Data Source to familiarize yourself with the content, and you can do your own prompts and validate the answers with the data.

3. Enable and create TEST_MCP Personal Access Token (PAT)

Ensure you have enabled the Personal Access Token (PAT) in Settings/General/Enable personal access token, and configured your Personal Access Token (PAT). If you need help, follow my Medium Post, where I explain how to get it.

Create a token TEST_MCP and copy the Secret value:

4. Open a terminal or a Command Prompt and install Node.js

Verify if you have an existing version of Node.js, or install it using the link. For use with Tableau MCP, you must have version 22.7.5 or later.

node --version
v25.1.0

5. Git or Extract the Tableau MCP code in your local folder

Clone the Tableau MCP GitHub Repository with the command:

git clone https://github.com/tableau/tableau-mcp

If you are not familiar with git pull, an easier way to get the code is to go to the <> Code / Local / Download Zip and extract it into a local folder.

6. Open a terminal or Command Prompt and build the local Tableau MCP

Go to your local path, for my case, it is under my user / tableaumcp / tableau-mcp, and run the following commands. For more information, check the Tableau MCP documentation

Open a terminal: (CMD.exe in Windows or Terminal.app on MacOS) and execute the following commands, change to your local path:

cd /Users/csaavedra/tableaumcp/tableau-mcp
npm install
npm audit fix
npm run build

After building the folder, you will get a similar message as the following:

7. Modify the file config.stdio.json (Unless you are using a Docker container, check the documentation)

Modify config.stdio.json with the full path to the local file build/index.js, the TEST_MCP token name as PAT_NAME, and the secret as PAT_VALUE, and the SERVER and SITE_NAME using the Tableau Cloud URL address.

As an example, my Tableau Cloud site is https://10ax.online.tableau.com/#/site/cristiansaavedradx, and my SERVER value is https://10ax.online.tableau.com, and my SITE_NAME is cristiansaavedradx

An example of what the file looks:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "tableau": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/Users/csaavedra/tableaumcp/tableau-mcp/build/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "TRANSPORT": "stdio",
        "SERVER": "https://10ax.online.tableau.com/",
        "SITE_NAME": "cristiansaavedradx",
        "PAT_NAME": "TEST_MCP",
        "PAT_VALUE": "0SueyEu7TNacnbX9XK6/Cw==:CUkQT56nVxIOkuYJXyEyt1HXEd2DhKDp",
        "DATASOURCE_CREDENTIALS": "",
        "DEFAULT_LOG_LEVEL": "debug",
        "INCLUDE_TOOLS": "",
        "EXCLUDE_TOOLS": "",
        "MAX_RESULT_LIMIT": "",
        "DISABLE_QUERY_DATASOURCE_FILTER_VALIDATION": "",
        "DISABLE_METADATA_API_REQUESTS": ""
      }
    }
  }
}

8. Install and configure Claude Desktop

Download Claud Desktop from https://www.claude.com/download and follow the steps including verify your account by email:

And the creation of a new account, if you don’t have one, associate it with the email you selected:

9. Edit Config claude_desktop_config.json on Claude Desktop

Go to Settings> Developer on Claude Desktop, then choose Edit Config.

10. Copy and paste the configuration

Copy and paste the text from config.stdio.json into claude_desktop_config.json and restart or quit Claude Desktop.

11. Check the Local MCP Server is working

Open the Claude Desktop and go to Settings > Developer and check the Tableau Server with the status running:

12. Start a new chat using Tableau MCP

Open a new chat and select the second icon, “Search and tools”, and verify the tableau toggle is enabled. You can check all the tools available by clicking the arrow.

13. List all the Data Sources

Try with the prompt: List all data sources, wait for the answer, and select Always allow

Challenge

Your challenge is to explore prompts that use different tools listed in the tableau MCP, give a list of prompts, and identify which tools were used.

Check the complete list of tools available for Tableau MCP and select prompts that bring at least three tools.

DataDev Rules!

Have you already solved it?

You can learn more from this exercise by exploring all the tools or by playing with more advanced tools, such as the Pulse Metrics.

Who am I?

Hey, I forgot to introduce myself. I am Cristian Saavedra Desmoineaux, a Tableau Visionary & DataDev Ambassador, and co-founder of DataDevQuest. I am passionate about solving data problems and have over 20 years of experience in complex scenarios. You can contact me on LinkedIn.

DataDev Rules!

Special Thanks

I want to give special thanks to Will Sutton. Through this and the Tableau Langchain project, what started as teamwork turned into a friendship, and I’m very thankful for that. And of course, my gratitude to Joe Constantino, whose support made this possible.