Trouble with joining file (vlookup) - help!

[elstar]

Hi, I'm very new to Alteryx and have tried the solution provided in some of the community discussion here but to no avail. I hope someone can help enlighten me with the errors I encountered please.

I have a master file with below details and would like to include the first 4 columns in the output only. Hence i use a Select tool to choose the first 4 columns.

Action Plan ID	Action Name	Action Description	Owner	Process timeline	Risk
1	Plan	To plan	John	2 weeks	Medium
2	Build	To build	Sam	5 weeks	High
3	Supervise	To supervise	Peter	2 weeks	Medium
4	Checks	To check	Tom	1 week	Medium

But i would also like to add on the "Department" and "Subgroup" from another file into the Master File above based on the Action Plan ID

Action Plan ID	Action Name	Action Description	Owner	Department	Sub group
1	Plan	To plan	John	A	Albatross
2	Build	To build	Sam	B	Bald Eagle
3	Supervise	To supervise	Peter	C	Cuckoo
4	Checks	To check	Tom	D	Dodo

I used the Join function based on Action Plan ID and checked the boxes for Department and Sub Group but it doesn't not seem to work. 

Which part did i make the mistake please? Thanks in advance

[atcodedog05 · Accepted solution]

Hi @elstar 

Here is how you can do it.

Workflow:

Hope this helps : )

[elstar]

Thanks so much for your guidance! It works when i join by Action Name but when I tried joining by Action ID it has this error "String fields can only be joined to other string fields"

In reality, my Action ID consist of 6 digits e,g. 650409. Is it because my data type is not correct? Thanks in advance~

[Qiu]

@elstar 
I believe it is the data type difference causing this error as you said.
we can use a Select Tool to force the data before Join.

[amruthas2]

@elstar"String fields can only be joined to other string fields" - Yes this error is due to data type mismtach, there is no compulsion that it needs to be byte or string, but compulsion is the fields you match need to be in same data type. String - String or byte - byte

Note - you can just validate if your data types are right while joining, but you will have to use select function to change the data types before you join for the function to work right, any changes made for data types in join would reflect for further transform but not the join itslef. 

[elstar]

thank you @amruthas2 and @qiu!

I've checked multiple times that the Action ID are both the same data type V_String size  255 but the same error persist. Since it is numeric, i've changed the data type to Int64 and it now works! 

But there seems to be a warning message "Joins on Double or Float are not recommended due to rounding error". Is it advisable to ignore this because i did not use Double or Float as the data type. 

ps: The output seems what I would like to have, thanks so much to you guys who have helped! 

[amruthas2 · Accepted solution]

Yea, we can defineintly ignore that error if we are not using 'Double or Float' for the table join, but a quick advice, the error doesnt pop up if werent actually using it, so may be just double check the input files for join would help.

Also until the Action Plan ID doesnt have some data like 1, 1.11, 1.19 .. so on.., the error doesnt impact the join.

[atcodedog05 · Accepted solution]

Hi @elstar 

Yes you can ignore this warning

But there seems to be a warning message "Joins on Double or Float are not recommended due to rounding error". Is it advisable to ignore this because i did not use Double or Float as the data type. 

If you want to get rid of this warning just convert to string datatype before and join. Let me know if you are facing any issues.

[elstar]

I've changed to String and i've also checked my data... but still have the warning message. I'll ignore the warning for now. Thank you so much for all your advices!! 

[atcodedog05]

Happy to help : ) @elstar 

Cheers and have a nice day!