Using Alteryx in a classroom

[nabilbeit]

Good day,

I am an instructor and quite grateful for Alteryx for creating the "Alteryx for Good" program. I use it with different groups of adult learners and love all the material available online to train and learn.

Are there best practices for instructors on how best to work within a group? I have created a step by step learning and some exercises based on the material available on the site. Yet would be interested to know how others deal with groups and individuals within groups.

It would be great to learn different ways on how to have students share their workflows back and forward (besides sending .zip files with workflows and data files)?

Thank you

Nabil

[cmcclellan]

You could create a shared Dropbox folder and then each student creates their own folder in that.  They save to their folder, but anyone can navigate to the other locations and open.  Dropbox also has built-in versioning, so it's easier to "go back to something earlier" to compare

[WilliamR · Accepted solution]

Hi,

do you know the way you can easily package your work (workflow, dataset, macro,...) by using the "export" option in the menu (option). The student will select the assets he wants to export, it will create a package (.yxzp) with relative path for all assets. This will facilitate the collaboration. Students can share ths package through file management system and download it. Just double clicking on the package will uncompress it and open the workflow with correct links. 

[nabilbeit]

Than you @WilliamR, Tried it on a workflow and it work. Got an error

(MISSING) C:\...\AppData\Local\Alteryx\bin\RuntimeData\Macros\Predictive Tools\Sample Data.yxdb

           ... is my directory structure

When I run the packaged file, I got an issue with the Workflow Dependencies. Related to the above under Field Summary 

However if I ignore and press ok to continue, the workflow runs.

[nabilbeit]

Thank you @cmcclellan

I like both this solution and @WilliamR 's 

Each one has its advantages.

As an instructor, I want to have the ability to run the workflow quickly if necessary. Having the Dropbox solution meets that requirement.

Another requirement is to be able to track when it was submitted and keep a record of the work beyond the instructor's mandate (if I no longer teach, the university does not have a history of submissions), this is where @WilliamR's solution comes in. The issue I see with it is that you can run into packaging issues (similar to what I saw) and then the students will not know what to do (which errors are acceptable and which ones are not). However, this one gives traceability and platform independence. I will explore both further.