How to write = sign coming from database column out to excel file.

[dalchand]

Hi, I have very simple workflow read some values from text input(eventually database) and writing to database. 

When I open the excel output generated from this workflow I see following error.

we found a problem with some content in 'xxxx.xlsx' Do you want us to try to recover as much as we can?

And when I click on yes, It just changes the field3 values like below.

Badly need your help guys. This happened in production after upgrading from 2019.3.5 to 2022.1.1

[Yoshiro_Fujimori]

Hi @dalchand ,

When a cell starts with "=", Excel takes it a formula, and validates its format.

Your Field3 is not a valid format as Excel formula, which causes the error.

If you want to keep the string as it is, you may want to add a quote (') at the head of the string, as the attached workflow.

See also:

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Knowledge-Base/Writing-Formulas-to-Excel/ta-p/1233...

Good luck.

[dalchand]

Thank you for quick response.

few things to consider here. It was working as it is in 2019.3.5 but since we upgraded to 2022.1.1 it stopped working. 

Also when I apply suggested solution It shows me quotes in the start of values in field3

[Yoshiro_Fujimori]

Though I don't know about your Excel environment, 

as long as Excel outputs the error, it is more likely that the change of behavior of was caused by Excel (not Alteryx).

And (same as Alteryx) Excel behaves differently by its version.

So it may be safer that you save the data as text (.csv) and import it from Excel (instead of opening the file).

The solution 1 of this post may help you.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53410490/i-am-getting-an-error-as-name-while-opening-csv-file-in...

Also Excel allows you to define the data type during the import process.

Good luck.

[dalchand]

These files goes to our business team and it's really difficult for us to manipulate data or change the file type. I am meeting our Alteryx rep tomorrow. 

Thank you so much for suggesting the solution.

[sparksun · Accepted solution]

You may use table and render tools to solve it

[dalchand]

Render tools gives me PDF. I need excel as output file

[Yoshiro_Fujimori]

@dalchand ,

You can select the file format on Render tool.

Output .xlsx

[sparksun]

It seems you are not familar with Render tool, actually you can choose various file types in Render configuration, including excel.

[dalchand]

Really Appreciate Yoshiro_Fujimori and sparksun. This solved my problem.