How to take Key and Description from the Input question anchor of Tree Interface Tool

[amitupadhyay]

Hello community members,

I am using tree interface tool to filter multiple hierarchical selections. I made a standard macro to generate the Description and Key fields. I want to pass this Description and Key Fields coming from the macro to feed into the Tree Interface Tool. But I am not able to connect it to the Input Question Anchor of the Tree Interface Tool. What is the way to solve this?

[mbarone · Accepted solution]

Unfortunately that's not how the interface tree tool works.  You have to first create a separate file (YXDB preferably since that's native to Alteryx) with the Key/Desc values, then use the option in the tree tool to point it to that custom file/database.  Will it be static, or will it potentially change with each run?  If static, just configure the tree tool to point to it using the custom file/database.

If it will potentially change with each run, then you'll need to create it on the fly via chained apps.  The first app would create the key/desc YXDB.  The second app would reference it, but when you publish the app to the Gallery, you mark the YXDB as an asset so it essentially creates one each time it's run for each user.

Are you familiar with chained apps yet?

[danilang · Accepted solution]

Hi @amitupadhyay 

I've struggled with this in the past and found no way to do it in a single workflow.  I ended up using a chained app where the first one generates a .yxdb which is read by the Tree tool in the second workflow and also read using Data Input tool.  The tree tool modifies a Filter to return the description associated with the key  

Dan

[amitupadhyay]

Thank you mbarone and danilang for your insights. I indeed followed the same steps as suggested by both of you. I made a macro which converts the table to get Description and Keys. Unfortunately, the values are not static as the input table changes periodically. So, I used chaining of apps to first get the description and keys in one app and use tree interface to filter the selections in another app.

But, I am just curious if the tree interface tool doesn't support the input question anchor! Why do we have that anchor then? Is there some other application of that particular anchor?