Unable to replace Workflow in Collection

[nickdreach]

We have a collection for workflows and schedules, used by myself and one colleague.  Yesterday a change was made by my colleague to a regularly scheduled workflow, which unfortunately introduced a small error.  I have corrected the error (downloaded the workflow from the gallery, fixed, uploaded back to the gallery), but when I come to use the 'Replace Workflow' option, I cannot select it as it is greyed out.

Is there any kind of setting that might allow us to amend and replace each other's workflows?

[OllieClarke]

Thanks for keeping us updated @nickdreach 

Yeah, opening from gallery, deleting all the tools, copy/pasting in another workflow and saving back to gallery does work, but it really doesn't feel like an enterprise solution, or one I feel that comfortable with.
I don't think the API will solve the issue, although I could be wrong :)

[OllieClarke]

@nickdreach going back to your post on VPNs, when you're on the Alteryx VPN, who are you logged in as? And what user is the gallery connection under?

[nickdreach]

@OllieClarke I'm on the VPN as 'me' and I have my own 'server' account which I use for the gallery.  Alteryx were, in their words, 'sorry' that we have to toggle between two VPNs - not sure they'd seen it before.  It is on our roadmap to fix, but it sounds like it isn't anywhere near the top of the list.  One slight silver lining is I found that you could open a workflow direct from the server, decide you'd definitely have to switch VPNs to e.g. complete an execution of a database-based workflow....on succesful completion you can switch back to the Alteryx VPN and do a Save (not save as) and somehow it knows 'where it came from' and you can publish back over the top of the original that you opened.

By the time you throw in some difficulties with Python-based tools like Google Drive Input, AMP, macros and credentials for the same, we're having quite a mediocre time at the moment!

[nickdreach]

Oh and on your API point, I totally agree - just because you are not selecting from menus and pressing buttons, under the hood I'd be 99% certain that the API just replicates the menu selections and button pressing.....and therefore encounters the same restrictions.

[nickdreach]

@OllieClarke interesting response from Alteryx:
The latest 23.1 release doesn't have anything different that helps.  However:

In 23.1 we introduce an API endpoint POST /v3/workflows/{workflowId}/versions that allows Curator_B to upload a new version of User_A's workflow (example image below). When you upgrade to 23.1 this will be another option for you that's easy to perform in the Server UI's API documentation or automate in a workflow using the Server API Tool
 https://marketplace.alteryx.com/en-US/apps/418052/server-api-tool

Sadly that upgrade is some way away, for us - but interesting that the API will, in theory, 'fill the functionality gap'

[OllieClarke]

@nickdreach that is cool - I'll have to test it out :)

[nickdreach]

@OllieClarke Ah do you have that version?  It'd be gold dust to me if you could post back your findings!

[OllieClarke · Accepted solution]

@nickdreach 
Just tried it out with a simple workflow. I could publish a new version of a workflow owned by someone else that lived in a different private studio using the API



You can chose who the owner of the new version is, but I don't think you can chose the private studio. So the new version of the workflow now resides in my private studio (whereas before it was in my colleague Luke's).




The setup using the api documentation was pretty straightforward. Although you need to have a .yxzp in order to publish (and automating the creation of these is not as simple as creating and renaming a .zip.




Anything else you want me to test?

[nickdreach]

@OllieClarke wow - I should mark that post as the solution!  Thank you very much for taking the time to do that.  If you have the inclination, what if you create a new Collection, add both you and Luke to it as users and get Luke to upload one of his workflows?  You then get that workflow from the Collection.  Make a micro change to the workflow.  Can you then leverage the API to upload the minimally changed version of the workflow?  Does it still behave as above e.g. it might originally have been owned by Luke, but the version 2 (Published) actual lives in your studio - but Luke can access it via the collection?  This looks very promising.

[OllieClarke]

@nickdreach that's exactly what I did :)

The Schedule Test workflow was in a collection just for Luke and me. Luke initially made the workflow, so it lived in his private studio under his files.

I slightly amended the workflow, saved it as a .yxzp and then used the API to publish a new version. 


As I set Luke as the owner of the workflow still, I can view it under my shared with me files, but not my files.
From his perspective, even though the workflow is in my private studio, it's still under his files (as he's the owner).



We can both access the workflow through the collection