Macro Dynamic Drop Down

[pgosztonyi]

Hi,

I am designing a macro that has a drop down question which gets populated from a database table. The trouble I have is that the macro seems to cache the database entries from the last time I open the macro, run and safe it. I know it's possible, as for example the "Salesforce Input" tool does exactly that. you enter your credentials, hit Connect and it fetches all available objects to choose from. If I add an object in Salesforce and go back into the Alteryx tool, it automatically refreshes the drop down list and the new object is there.

Any hints much appreciated...

Thanks

Peter

[ChrisTX · Accepted solution]

See the comment from DanM on this page:

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Knowledge-Base/Tool-Mastery-Drop-Down/ta-p/37094

...create a chained workflow. The first workflow would update an output, which in turn you would use that output to update the Drop Down 

[pgosztonyi · Accepted solution]

Thanks, I stumbled across a Youtube video which in essence explained the same thing. the issue was indeed that I populated the drop down tool with a data flow within the same macro - this didn't run until the macro ran.

I didn't need a second workflow though to fix it. As all data is in a database, I just had to change the drop down tool to use an external source and used a select statement as the external source. Now the drop down tool has no dependency on any other tools.

Peter

[pgosztonyi]

Just to take it one step further. In the Salesforce tool I can select an object which then populates a list box with the columns. Would you know how to populate a second drop down tool based on the selection in the first tool? 

[ChrisTX]

See this post:

Populate second drop-down based on previous selection

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Populate-second-drop-down-based-on-pre...

[pgosztonyi]

Thanks again - if possible I would want to avoid a chain flow to achieve this. the Salesforce Input tools could somehow do it. Unfortunately with the latest version of Alteryx Designer, I can't open the Salesforce Input tool anymore to see how it was done. I know the new tools are Python based which surely allows for more flexibility. 

[spandan92]

Hi @ChrisTX 

Please help & suggest if there is any workaround for my situation as described below. I have to query data from different databases (for example: DB1, DB2, DB3) but the field names across these databases are exactly same, so the query remains the same. I want to build a macro, such that in the DROP-DOWN i would select the required database and then accordingly the query would work.
Is this possible in Macro Drop-Down? Please help

Thanks

Spandan

[ChrisTX]

Take a look at some of the capabilities of the Action tool.  In Designer, there are a few examples under Help > Sample Workflows > Learn one tool at a time > Interface > Action