DSN-less connections for InDB

[SeanAdams]

Currently the InDB tools require to select a DSN that is defined on your computer.

This makes any workflow which uses a DSN incredibly painful to deploy to the server, since the DSN needs to be created on every worker node and for a large server environment this can  mean creating DSN entries on 6+ worker nodes in prod plus prod server plus dev/UAT environment plus dev/UAT worker nodes.

Could we please change the InDB tools to default to DSN-less connections, where the connection persists the connection details in-line so that it can deploy to the server without a DSN setup (since all connection details are contained within the connection string)?

Thank you

Sean

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[adrianloong]

+1

[jithinmony]

+1 Defaulting to DSN free connections would be a welcomed change

[EEdLoh]

Can't in-DB connections use any connection string that is manually typed? My company currently has a number of In-DB connections where the connection string is "aka:{24-char alnum}" in order to use them with Saved Gallery Connections, which are DSN-less. I don't mean to be a Debby-Downer, but it seems like this functionality exists at least as much as it does for regular Input Data tools. If anything, the post could be modified to make creating DSN-less connections easier/more intuitive in all connection tools.

[SeanAdams]

Thanks @EEdLoh - what we're looking for is to be able to do this without having to create Saved Gallery Connections.

The thinking here is that we are looking to minimize the workload on our admin team, and currently using gallery connections requires manual setup by the gallery admin team which we're trying to avoid.

Now - if an Alteryx job carries its own DSN-less connections then there is zero work from the admin team to deploy on any number of servers.

[EEdLoh]

Hey @SeanAdams, I a just trying to point out that in-DB tools and regular input tools have exactly the same functionality as far as DSN-less connections are concerned or even connection strings in general. 

[SeanAdams]

Thank you @EEdLoh

Is it possible, from the designer, to use a manually typed DSN-less connection on an In-DB tool without using server defined connections?

If so, then this issue is solved, and as you say above it's more about efficiency.

Thanks for contributing to this!

Sean

[EEdLoh]

@SeanAdams@@@ it is absolutely possible to use manually typed strings in an in-DB connections. Any string that will work in an Input tool will work in an in-DB tool connection. 

[SeanAdams]

Hey @EEdLoh

Just checked - and I agree that you can use a hand-typed connection string, however the In-DB tools require that this be converted to a connection alias.    What this means is that the details of the actual connection are not included in the canvas (only the alias) which makes this difficult to publish on a central server.

Let me know if I'm missing something - what we need is to be able to connect InDB without an alias but with a DSN-less connection string that is described in the canvas so that this can be published on the server with no Admin assistance.

Created a new connection - see the "TEstCon" aliasHere you can see that the in-DB connector only has "TestCon" as connectionSame in the full Canvas XML

[AidanBramel]

+1 on In-DB connections without aliases!! Would love to see the ability to input a connection string straight away like the Input Tool rather than needing to name the connection - lots of overhead involved with saved aliases.

[Mitchell_G]

+1, Alias' don't work for server. Need DSN-less connection strings for IN-DB!