Unable to detect excel sheet name

Hi, I am a new user with Alteryx. I have a bunch of system generated excel files as input files. Each file contains only 1 sheet and the sheet name are something like "#_of docs&abcd; deadlinedate" (i.e. starts with #, may contain characters like & ; , sheet name length is about 20 to 30 characters in length).
After selecting the file via Input, the sheet name is not displayed for selection. All I see is <List of Sheet Names>. If I continue and run the workflow, I see the error message "Field: "Sheets Names" is 0 length".
How to overcome this problem short of renaming each sheet first in Excel?

Input

Accepted answers

CiaranA

@Joon wrote:
Hi Ryan, I've checked the excel file extension. It is XLSX. Just discover that if I change File Format to Microsoft Excel Legacy (*.xlsx), it is able to pick up the sheet name. However, now the option to "Start Data Import on Line" option is no longer available. How can I get Alteryx to pick the data head from row 5 of the excel?

Use the sample tool to skip first four rows, then the Dynamic Rename to take field names from first row of data?

All comments

unknown

Have you select XLSX as an input but the input is actually a CSV? This can happen because most people have CSVs appear as Excel icons on their desktop which can mislead them. I say this because I was able to pull in a sheet with 31 full characters (Excel max for a sheet name) with many of the different symbols you listed below.

Joon

Hi Ryan, I've checked the excel file extension. It is XLSX. Just discover that if I change File Format to Microsoft Excel Legacy (*.xlsx), it is able to pick up the sheet name. However, now the option to "Start Data Import on Line" option is no longer available. How can I get Alteryx to pick the data head from row 5 of the excel?

CiaranA

@Joon wrote:
Hi Ryan, I've checked the excel file extension. It is XLSX. Just discover that if I change File Format to Microsoft Excel Legacy (*.xlsx), it is able to pick up the sheet name. However, now the option to "Start Data Import on Line" option is no longer available. How can I get Alteryx to pick the data head from row 5 of the excel?

Use the sample tool to skip first four rows, then the Dynamic Rename to take field names from first row of data?

Quick Links

This months top contributors

FláviaB 262

caltang 177

DanM 167

IraWatt 157

gawa 157