How to make R Tool not error when receiving no records

[RobMotiwalla]

Hey All -- 

I am working on a workflow that will read in batches of PDF files, save a copy using the Run command, then uses the R tool to read in those PDFs so they can be parsed. I can just use the PDF input tool from my desktop to achieve this, but I need it on our server, and the PDF input tool does not work on the server. I can do this just fine if I only have one input, but I would like to have the ability to read in up to five (or indefinite, whatever works). The problem I am running into is that the R tool throws an error if there are no records that flow through it, and that is an issue when trying to run on the server. 

Does anyone know of a workaround so that if there is less than 5 inputs, the workflow will still run without an error?

Here is how I have my R Tool configured (I'm not 100% clear on what is going on, as i just pulled this from the community)

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[KilianL · Accepted solution]

Hi @RobMotiwalla ,

a loop can solve this problem for you. You can input a list of file paths of your PDFs and all of them will be read in.

This can be an Alteryx Batch Macro or a for-loop in R. See example attached.

Here is the R Code for reference:

data <- read.Alteryx("#1", mode="data.frame")

#prepare empty data frame
txt = data.frame()

#run for loop over PDF paths
for (row in 1:nrow(data)) {
   temp <- pdftools::pdf_text(file.path(data[row, "FullPath"])) #PDF Input
   df <- data.frame(temp)
   txt <- rbind(txt, df) #union results
}

write.Alteryx(txt, 1)

Please mark this as the solution if it answers your question, it will help others to find solutions quicker.

Kind Regards,

Kilian

Solutions Engineer - Alteryx

[RobMotiwalla]

@KilianL Thank you so much, that worked perfectly!