Concatenate Multi-Row Header Option for Input Data Tool

[Jeff_Neklason]

Have you ever had the business deliver an Excel (EEK!) file to be passed into Alteryx with a different number of header rows (because it looks pretty and is convenient)? Never, you say? Lies! 

I would suggest adding an option to the Input Data Tool that would give us the ability concatenate multiple header rows. This would help enable accurate data profiling for columns when output and eliminate loss from unnecessary conversion errors. Currently, the options allow us to Start Data Input on Line X; however, if the header for the column is on multiple rows, they would have to be manually entered after input due to only being able to select the lowest possible row to assure the data is accurately passed. The solution would be to be able to specify the number of rows that contain headers, concatenate them to a single row (ignoring null and carriage return) and then output that as the header. 

The current functionality, in a situation where each row has a variable number of header rows, causes forced errors such as a scientific string conversion of a numeric value.

[mceleavey]

This is a good idea. As we currently have it, if your Excel sheet has multiple rows at the top you skip those rows and start import on Row X. This doesn't help if you have headers that span multiple rows. There are workarounds, but it would be really useful to simply say "rows 3,4,5 and 6 are header rows", then concatenate these and strip out nulls.

This would need to ignore carriage returns.

M.