Error Reading from a Directory and Publising to Tableau when Running Workflow from Server

[mwilson]

I have a workflow that runs fine from my desktop but fails when scheduled on Alteryx Server. The workflow reads a set of files from a directory and uses a macro to join the data together. The schemas are not the same across all files. The output is getting published to Tableau Server. The error that I receive is:

 SimpleDatabase::SelectMetadataName: expected found=1, actual found=0 (fk=7 name="Flag for Validity (Approved - Incremental/Approved - Non-Incremental/Rejected/¶Further Review/On Hold)" nameTable="COLUMNS")

"Flag for Validity..." is the name of one of the columns that does not exist in all files. However, it does exist in the file that I use as the input for the .yxmc file. If I do not publish to Tableau, but rather a .xlsx file, then the workflow runs successfully on Alteryx Server.

I have tried several things for troubleshooting, including having a few meetings with Alteryx Support in which they watched me walk through the workflow and scheduling, but no issue could be identified. I am using version 11.7.

[jamielaird]

Have you tried amending your workflow to force the creation of the 'Flag for Validity' column where it doesn't exist in the source file?

That way you'll have a consistent output schema which should resolve that particular error.

[mwilson]

I have not tried that yet but can. This workflow is actually owned by a user in the business team that I support, and she has stated that she needs the workflow to be able to bring in new fields as they appear. So the schema won't always be the same across files, and the workflow needs to be able to capture that dynamically.

[mwilson · Accepted solution]

I was able to resolve the issue by renaming the field that was generating the error when publishing to Tableau Online. I removed all special characters and dashes from the field names, and I was able to publish via Alteryx Server. This seems  like a Tableau issue if special characters cannot be contained in the name of a field that is not present in all files in the directory.