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Alteryx Connect Ideas

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Alteryx Connect has option for bulk export and import to and from Excel, but doing so is a manual operation.

This idea is to provide Designer connectors that operate like the Connect bulk export and import.

This would allow Connect content to be reported and improved using automation.

 

The metaloaders provided with Connect do a fine job doing loading a generic extract from many sources.

This new feature would allow Connect customers to improve on that generic extract without making changes to the metaloaders. 

Customer changes to metaloaders makes installing new releases expensive and risky.

When an Alteryx Workflow/Analytic App is uploaded to the Alteryx Gallery it can be shared with other users. Unfortunately the owner can only see the results of his/her own runs. 

We would like to have the possibility to share the workflow results for certain Apps/Workflows in the Alteryx Gallery with other users. Otherwise the only way to provide these results to the users is via MongoDB.

(Maybe they can be shared within collections or on a user level.)

Hello all,

I just had a meeting about Collibra. And there is a feature I would like to see on Alteryx connect : an addon to the browser of the user so that he can make a copy pasta from the dataviz application (https://marketplace.collibra.com/listings/desktop-app/ ). Very nice in demonstration and in real life.

 

image.png

Best regards,

Simon

We are moving our measure specifications that are in a PDF format to the Connect glossary.  We would like to keep the formatting that exists in the PDF when copying the spec.  However, the format doesn't always copy over.  It would be nice to have the 'Format Painter' option similar to what is in MS Word where you can copy the format from one line to another line.

 

Hello Alteryx Team,

 

We would like to be scheduling the loaders from the administration console, Connections tab. However, when scheduling from there, the loaders are being sent to the Alteryx Gallery under low priority and therefore can easily end up in a queue. As we are scheduling a number of loaders that run for a significant amount of time, it is essential to have the schedules set on precise times and have a certainty that they will not end up in a queue. However, the low priority in the Gallery prevents us from doing that.

 

It would be great if there was a priority switch directly in the Connect's Connections section, where it would be possible to select how prioritized should the loaders be in the Alteryx Gallery. Also a possibility to select a specific worker would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thank you very much for considering this idea.

 

Regards,

Jan Laznicka

Deploying Connect on MS SQL Server (https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Connect-Knowledge-Base/Deploy-Alteryx-Connect-on-MS-SQL-Dat...) we would like to use integrated security option when we setup jdbc connection.

 

For now workaround looks like this:

 

1. Copy the file “sqljdbc_auth.dll” into Alteryx folder:

sergiussrussia_0-1635855989196.png

 

2. Inside SQL Server Management Studio add Active Directory user to logins folder:

sergiussrussia_1-1635855989202.png

 

3. grant him(or her) the rights to connect to database. For test purposes I`ve granted sysadmin role:

sergiussrussia_2-1635855989205.png

 

4. Edit the connect.properties file:

sergiussrussia_3-1635855989206.png

 

Here we don`t need user and password lines at all. We only need to add “integratedSecurity=true”

Because there will be used credentials of user, using which Alteryx Connect was started, not the user which was provided in these red records.

But we still need these two records, because Alteryx will give us an error if it will not see these records inside config file during startup.

That`s why these records still must exist inside connect.properties file.

 

5. Setup Alteryx Connect service to start Alteryx Connect with Active Directory user, for which we granted access in SQL Server:

sergiussrussia_4-1635855989216.png

 

6. Start Alteryx Connect service and check with Ms SQL Profiler the user which is performing requests to database:

sergiussrussia_5-1635855989252.png

It`s Active directory (windows) user.

 

Hi Alteryx Team,

 

Can you please add PDF or Word Download Option for Glossary Definition Term in Alteryx Connect. 

 

Thanks

Sri

We found out that we are able to setup Nexus modes in global config settings.

We can distinguish modes by relationship types and object types. It is nice.

We would like to distinguish Nexus setting by object’s location as well (to show/hide objects in diagram by their location).

For example to show terms from one folder and to hide terms from another.

We ask you to make possibility to setup Nexus to filter out objects by their location.

Hi Alteryx team,

 

It would be great if it was possible to load SAP HANA systems using ODBC DSN instead of the normal host name.

 

From our experience, there is often more than 1 node present for SAP HANA systems and when entering the master node into the loader interface, we can't easily switch to a failover node when an unexpected event happens. Sometimes, it is not only the matter of nodes but for example a migration of an instance to cloud might result in a different host name. As a consequence, the loadcode is different and it is not possible to migrate the previous enrichment to the asset pages created under the new loadcode.

 

A solution for this would be the possibility of loading SAP HANA systems using the ODBC DSNs (this is already possible for example for Hive and it would be great if it was available for all applicable systems).

 

Thank you very much for considering this idea.


Regards,

Jan Laznicka

Hi Alteryx team,

 

In Connect, users are able to open workflows, open reports (like Tableau) or use data source in a workflow using the blue button on an asset page. With the new functionality of cataloguing APIs, would it be possible to implement this button for API endpoints as well, meaning users would be able to trigger the API directly from Connect?

 

2020-03-04 13_25_00-Get posts.png

 

Thank you very much.

Michal

Hi Alteryx team,

 

Would it be possible to implement custom URL in the HDFS loader when using Knox Gateway? This could be implemented in the same way as in the normal Input Data tool.

 

When connecting to HDFS using the Input Data tool, the URL is automatically generated, however, it is possible to change it. Sometimes this is necessary as the 'sandbox' part of the URL is for some companies not applicable, they have for example their company names instead of it:

 

JanLaznicka_0-1585161087518.png  JanLaznicka_1-1585161125093.png

 

 

However, in the Alteryx Connect HDFS loader, this is not possible as there is no such field in the interface:

 

JanLaznicka_2-1585160401795.png

The 'sandbox' part of the URL is then automatically brought through 2 formula tools:

 

JanLaznicka_3-1585160565194.png  JanLaznicka_4-1585160575989.pngJanLaznicka_5-1585160621052.png

 

This makes it impossible to load the HDFS metadata into Connect using the out-of-the-box Alteryx loader. Implementing a field into the interface like in the standard input data tool would solve this problem.

 

Thank you very much for considering this idea.

 

Regards,

Jan Laznicka

 

 

 

 

 

Hello Alteryx,

 

The Alteryx loader does an excellent job capturing the Data Connection information from workflows and visualizing the data in Connect. It would be an additional benefit if the Data Connection information could get more granular and include the columns utilized from each table in the workflow.

 

An example where this will provide valuable benefits:

If you have a table with 100 columns and it's utilized extensively in more than 50 workflows, how do you analyze the impact when you're notified that column ABCXYZ is going to be altered? Connect can tell me which workflows are using the table, but it can't tell me which workflow is specifically using column ABCXYZ.

 

This would greatly aid users who may be searching workflows for specific column usage.

 

Thank you,

Jason

Our Data Catalogue in Connect has about 2 millions items (tables, views, columns).

I see next issues:

  1. We collect metadata from about 10+ DBMS. So after each Metadata loader run, Alteryx Connect will start load_alteryx_db script and process whole staging area (DB_*) tables, not only current extracted metadata set from single DBMS. It will lead huge redundancy.
  2. Follows from first issue: One-by-one comparison of loaded metadata will take a lot of time in real environment with 1-2 millions items (ordinary situation in large Bank). And this comparison will be executed several times. It will increase the redundancy in the number of DBMS servers.
  3. All queries in this script containing column or table name as a parameter (e.g. src.TABLE_NAME='${query_table_name}' AND                                 src.COLUMN_NAME='${query_column_name}') will be executed as many times as number of columns in Data Catalogue (millions times). It will work very slow because it executes a lot of queries.

Can you optimize somehow this process?

Version upgrade of metaloaders gets difficult when customers change or add tools to already complex metaloader workflows.

 

Please better support customer customization by placing macros in the metaloaders at critical points

  • just after data input
  • just before data output

These macros would do nothing except pass data in and out

with the intent that customers build these out as they need to improve the resulting data catalog.

Most customer modifications could fit within limits of what these macros could do.

 

It would be easier to upgrade version when most often it only required replacing entire macros that had been modified.

The improvement would be worth the nominal impact on performance.

Where performance is a problem, un-customized macros could be removed.

.

We use Connect widely among hundreds of users. During a lot of concurrent sessions Connect begin to work slow and unstable.

It is nice to have high workload detection - to warn users about potential problems/instability/slow response (either by email or via some banner at the Home page).   

Please add possibility to sort and filter by any field in any asset, which has internal table. For example - column list in table, table list in schema. Or in "Used in " widget. as for now - sort operation is only applicable for name field. it is not convenient for long lists. 

Each workflow state has a very useful option: «Persistent» flag.

I understand how it works, but I would like to setup the system somehow to allow users to see public state by default.

My approach is simple. A lot of users visit Alteryx Connect for searching and reading. And I want to show them ‘public’ (official, approved) state of objects by default, not draft versions.

If the user would like to edit an asset, he/she can exit from public mode explicitly.

Big organizations have strong security policies and one of our potential customers would like to distinguish superadmin actions (login, change the config, change permissions) from other action. For example, they ask to change logging level (from INFO to WARN) when superadmin is logging in.

Our customers would like to see propagated data lineage. For example, if some columns in different tables are linked together, obviously, tables have dependencies as well. So it is a good option to have the possibility to view child objects' relationships. It allows analysing impact and data lineage between objects deeper. 

Manage permissions based on entry type. E.g. I set up some folders structure and I’d like to allow to users only create glossary terms, not new folders. So if I set up CREATECHILD permissions, it allows to create subfolders as well.