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Alteryx Designer Desktop Discussions

Find answers, ask questions, and share expertise about Alteryx Designer Desktop and Intelligence Suite.

Overwrite selected columns and retain content in other columns

MadhuraBuchake
7 - Meteor

Hello All,

 

I have 13 columns and I need to overwrite only the first 10 columns. The data from columns K-M should remain the same. I tried doing the following things but nothing worked:

1. While saving the sheet I specified the column range. (A-J)

2. In the output tool I specified " data.xlsx|||Overwrite$A:J " by this way, and also used the 'Overwrite Sheet/ Range' option.

 

Please let me know what can be done.

Please find attached the screenshots.

 

Thank you!!

 

 

 

 

20 REPLIES 20
alexnajm
17 - Castor
17 - Castor

I would put in some numbers - for example, A1 to J100000!

MadhuraBuchake
7 - Meteor

Thanks for your reply. 

Yes, I tried with numbers as well but got the below error:

"Specified range is not large enough for incoming data fields"

alexnajm
17 - Castor
17 - Castor

Can you double check the amount of columns coming out of Alteryx then and going into your output? Columns A through J is 10 columns but if you have 11 or more going into the output, this will not work. Screenshots to prove this would be great as well.

MadhuraBuchake
7 - Meteor

Oh yes, I do have more than 10 columns. Last 3 columns are manual entries and those shouldn't get updated. I am assuming Alteryx can overwrite selected columns, and not the entire sheet.

 

Please find the attached screenshot.

alexnajm
17 - Castor
17 - Castor

Yes I understand - however this screenshot reflects the Excel. Can you provide a screenshot of the date in Alteryx so we can confirm that you are passing through 10 columns into the final Output Data tool?

MadhuraBuchake
7 - Meteor

I am trying to include as many screenshots as possible. Hope it helps!! :)

Data1: Input1 (10 Columns)

Data2: Input2(selecting only last 3 columns)

using left outer join to combine all the inputs and final output should have 13 columns in total. 

Expected: Last 3 columns should not refresh

alexnajm
17 - Castor
17 - Castor

Notice in the Select tool you have 13 columns selected - this means that you would be trying to pass through 13 columns from Alteryx into 10 columns in the Excel. Go ahead and amek sure you have only 10 columns in your Select tool!

MadhuraBuchake
7 - Meteor

I do want the last 3 columns in the excel sheet. I want all the 13 columns in the final sheet and the goal is to overwrite only the first 10 columns and keep the last 3 columns as it is, because they are manual entries. So in the select tool I need to select the 13 (A-M) columns and keep the range as A-J to refresh/overwrite.

alexnajm
17 - Castor
17 - Castor

Exactly - you want to keep them there so you don’t want to overwrite them, meaning you have to tell Alteryx not to overwrite them which you are doing by saying only overwrite A-J. You are only overwriting A-J, but you are trying to force in 13 columns into 10. Use the Select tool to only keep the first 10 and remove the last 3. I promise it will work!

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