Best Method for Updating Engine Constants When Moving Workflows Between Environments?

Question

Hello,

As part of a proof-of-concept exercise, I need to demonstrate how we would move workflows and its supporting configuration files from one directory structure to another as part of moving them to a production environment on Alteryx Server. In Alteryx Desktop when I perform a Save As... of an existing workflow to a new directory, the Engine constants, e.g. WorkflowDirectory, are updated to reflect the new directory.  However, not surprisingly, this doesn't happen outside of  Alteryx when I copy an entire directory with a workflow and supporting files to a new location.

I imagine I could write a script to update the XML directly as part of the copy operation.   However, before I do that, I would like to know what tools and practices others use for promoting Alteryx workflows and their supporting files.

Thanks,

Iver

Claje · Accepted Answer

Hi,

The Engine constants are defined by the Alteryx engine at runtime - something like the workflow directory is completely dynamic and will automatically update without need for any additional changes.

To test this, you can try running a workflow on your server via command line.

To see that this information is not stored at the workflow level, try opening a brand new Alteryx workflow and saving it (without any tools).  If you look at the XML inside the workflow, you will see that the engine constants are not stored in the workflow XML at all.

Hope this helps!