Alteryx not Reading All Excel Files AND Join Issue

[alteryxuser_1184]

There are 2 problems I'm facing:-

1st problem:
I'm facing an issue where input tool is not reading all the files. I have 99 excel files. Now, these excel files were originally in PDF. So I standardized each excel file after converting. However, when I input all of them, Alteryx is only able to read 18 files. The reason Alteryx gives on not importing the other 81 files is this: 'Table 1' has a different schema than the 1st file in the set and will be skipped. I then separated 81 and 18 files in different directories and imported them separately. However, again Alteryx is unable to read all 81 files. Attached "ADDRESS-CUSTOM" is one of these 99 files that Alteryx is not reading. Since these excel files were originally in PDF, it could be that after conversion to excel, Alteryx is unable to read. Or it could be some configuration in Excel security settings? Attached is the "reading error" screenshot. 

2nd problem:
I imported 2 datasets and joined. Before joining, I used unique tool to segregate unique and non-unique. The join output is only showing 1 record. Expectation is 8 records. Attached "ACH-CUSTOM" and "precision_mapping_" files. For ACH_CUSTOM, I configured Output file name as field as "File Name Only" in order to join with precision_mapping's "Raw Table Name" key. As you all can see, both files have 8 records each so the expectation from Alteryx is to have output of 8 rows. Attached "join workflow" output shows only 1 record.

[mceleavey · Accepted solution]

Hi @alteryxuser_1184 ,

The two issues are related to the following:

1. When importing multiple excel files via the standard input method using * in the filepath you will need to have the same schema, that is every file will need to have the identical layout. Now, because of Excel, this is rarely the case. 

See THIS thread to see how you can get around this problem.

You will need to download a couple of tools which are included in the package on that link.

2. It looks like you are trying to load in temporary file, hence the ~prefix on the filename. If you are using the directory tool you will need to adjust your file mask to remove these. Ensure all files are saved correctly and none are currently open.

Without seeing your workflow this about as much detail as I can provide.

I hope this helps,

M.