Can I suppress an output tool excel or csv from being generated if data set is empty?

Greetings community,

I have several checks on data that produce an excel when the criteria matched. Many of these conditions are a result of a comparison between two data sets. So there is a file for the items that fall out of the left join on the L and R anchors as well as the reconciled data set from J anchor thus producing several files. A large majority of the time, either the L or R are empty and the output tool, excel file is produced with just the headers. Is there any way to suppress this when there is no data set?

Thanks

Kimberly

Output

Accepted answers

JosephSerpis

Hi @kimc745 check out the solution from this post it should answer your ask.

alexnajm

There is also the option to use the Message tool and use the option "Error - Stop Passing Records Through This Tool" - that way it doesn't write out if there is no data. It will produce an error, but it should not prevent the rest of your workflow from running.

All comments

JosephSerpis

Hi @kimc745 check out the solution from this post it should answer your ask.

alexnajm

kimc745

@JosephSerpis Thank you. That worked for one of the scenarios but not the other where I need to pass on a full path variable to the output file. So in about 80% of cases, this works perfectly! Very much appreciate the response! :-)

@alexnajm I will look into your suggestion to see if it fits the custom filepath scenario where I cannot use the first one. Much appreciated!

sp210708

An alternate solution -

Coming out of the L or R anchors add a table tool, then an email tool.

If there is 0 records then it will not send an email but if there is 1 or more records it will send an email.

if this works please mark this as an accepted solution,

thanks,

kimc745

Hi @sp210708

Thank you. I am new to the tool (couple of months) and we do not have any email integration setup. Not sure if I can test that. Will have a look to see if I can. Right now all the files are written to a fileshare for the group using them.

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