Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

This idea has arisen from a conversation with a colleague @Carlithian where we were trying to work out a way to remove tools from the canvas which might be redundant, for example have you added a select tool to the canvas which hasn't been configured to change a data type or rename a field. So we were looking for ways of identifying in the workflow xml for tools which didn't have a configuration applied to them.

This highlighted to me an issue with something like the data cleanse tool, which is a standard macro.

The xml view of the data cleanse configuration looks like this:

<Configuration>
  <Value name="Check Box (135)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (136)">False</Value>
  <Value name="List Box (11)">""</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (84)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (117)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (15)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (109)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (122)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (53)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (58)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (70)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Check Box (77)">False</Value>
  <Value name="Drop Down (81)">upper</Value>
</Configuration>

As it is a macro, the default labelling of the drop downs is specified in the xml, if you were to do something useful with it wouldn't it be much nicer if the interface tools were named properly - such as:

So when you look at the xml of the workflow it's clearer to the user what is actually specified.

There are many circumstances when you have to build an interative macro where it's not just the iterating data set that needs to change every iteration, but also a second data set.

Think about this like a loop where two different variables are updated on every iteration, not just the control variable in the For xxx control variable.

The way that users work around this is to use a temporary yxdb file where instead of a macro input you input from the yxdb, and then write back to the same yxdb.    This allows you to pretend that you can adjust 2 different data sets on every cycle of the loop.    there are 4 downsides to this:
a) User complexity - this breaks the conceptual simplicity of macro inputs since now the users have to understand that in situation X I use macro inputs; and in situation Y I have to use some other type of tool.

b) Speed penalty - writing to disk is between 1000x slower and 1 000 000x slower than working with data in memory (especially if it's in cache) - so by forcing this to go through a yxdb file, you do incur a speed penalty which is just not needed

c) blocking penalty - Because of the fact that you can't write to a file that you're still reading from, you need to pepper this with Block until done tools - and you need to initialize the macro using a first write to the yxdb file outside the macro - which further hurts speed.    Given the nuanced behaviour of block-until-done, this also introduces user complexity issues

d) Self-contained - because you have to initialize these files outside the macro - the macro is no-longer self-contained and portable (which breaks the principle of Information Hiding which is a key pillar of good modular decoupled software design.

The other way that users work around this - is to serialize their entire second recordset into a field which then gets tacked onto the iterating data set using an iterative macro.   This is HIGHLY wasteful becuase then you have to build a serialize & deserialize process for this second recordset.    It fixes the speed and blocking penalites from above, but introduces a computational overhead which is generating no value; and makes this even more complex for users - and a further blocker to using macros.

Recommendation:

We could make this simpler by allowing users to create multiple pairs of macro input / macro outputs so that 2 or 3 or n different data sets can be updated with every iteration.

Below is a screenshot demonstrating this, from an Advent of code challenge - the details of the problem are not important - the issue at hand is that there are 2 record sets which both need to be updated on every iteration.

cc: @NicoleJohnson @Samanthaj_hughes @SteveA 

Hello, 

Please can we have some drawing tools, so we can add another dimension to our workflows.  I would like to draw arrows and lines across my workflow, so I can show the different stages of the workflow. I could use containers as an alternative, but feel lines would be better.

Also, is their a grid-line option, and a space equally (to spread tools evenly across work page), and an auto straighten!

Also, when you FIND, it would be nice if the Find box is allowed to stay on screen, whilst you work on the tool that has just been found; and if the founded tool can be highlighted more clearly so it can be seen. 

Also, a timer, so we can see how long the workflow runs for.

That's it for now. 

Thanks

We have Alteryx running in AWS which seems to be a common setup.Our AWS instances are set-up with IAM roles which has been one of the security measures applied in order to finally allow our enterprise company to allow some development in the cloud. IT will not allow the sharing of Access keys to connect to S3.

• Would like to use the AWS S3 Tools from the connectors palette as the AWS CLI has limited ability to handle/report exceptions or issues with any detail. At the moment, we are limited on what goes into production as we are using CLI for what we can.
• Ideally, an option would be to add to the S3 Tools allowing the user to select IAM Roles rather than Key Access. Refer the screen attached.

Hi Alteryx Devs - 

It would be *really tight* to have a drop down interface tool that would support auto completion based on a odbc connection to a table/column or ajax call.  I recently had a situation wherein we need to give the users the ability to select an address, then run a workflow.  But the truth is, our address data is terrible, and what I really needed was to be able to let the users start typing the address, then give them a list of choices to pick from, they pick the correct (but usually wrongly formatted) address, and then I send that value into the workflow. 

I could not find a decent way to give a gallery user a reliable way to pick an address from our list, so eventually wound up having to write an ajax piece to handle the auto completion, capture the user input, then post to a service that would in turn, interact with gallery through the API, get the response, and send it back calling page, and back to the user.  A significant amount of work to put into something that is an exceedingly common web operation of auto completion.  

This would make a lot of gallery operations flow so much more naturally.  

Thanks for listening! 

brian

When training people on the use of action tools, something that I always have to hit on is that when you are telling the tool which piece of the XML that you are adjusting, it's sort of difficult to tell what you have selected, and super easy to accidentally select something else.

Example:

When you initially select the action to take it's this nice Blue Color. However, it still doesn't feel exactly like you have actually selected anything or told the Action Tool what to do, since it's so easy to just select any other one of these actions.

A slightly different problem is that if you are selecting an action that has been previously configured, it is just this light grey color. So it can be easy to accidentally change your settings because you may not realize it's actually set up.

Here is a recent community post that sort of outlines a few of these problems.

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Analytic-App-to-Create-Custom-SQL-Quer...

I am running into unexpected functionality when utilizing the date interface tool in an Analytic App after upgrading to 21.3. Previously I was able to easily select dates in the past in the app interface by first selecting the Year, then the month, date, etc. After updating I am only able to see the prior and upcoming three months, which makes it difficult if you need to navigate back, say, 10 years. A ticket was put in they could not find when or why this change was made. This issue was brought up to our Designer SME group and they agreed that this isn't an improvement on the old design and is more cumbersome. They recommended posting to the Ideas page to bring back the old design.

1.  I would like the tab color/contrast of the active tab to be more prominent / discernible.  It does not really stand out. 

2.  I would like the ability to set default colors for different open workflow types -- standard workflow, macro, analytical app, so I can use color to quickly distinguish between tab dependencies or simply what is what.

3.  I would like the ability to change the color of any tab at any time (similar to Tableau Desktop, but with greater color choice).

Similar to previous ideas from @patrick_mcauliffe and @shailesh_patel - would like to request 2 things:

Default on Folder Picker Interface tool

The folder picker tool does not currently allow a default value - this unnecessarily adds work if users have the same value 90% of the time.

Please add a field for the default value that will show when the interface starts up

Similar ideas:

- Default on Date interface: https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Ideas/Default-Date-for-Interface-Tool/idi-p/35770

- Default on File Selector: https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Ideas/Default-file-location-in-file-broswer-Interf...

I'd like to hold CTRL, click on a tool and drag it to somewhere else on the canvas to copy it. 

This is functionality common in other software (e.g. Tableau, MS Office). 

Currently I have to either:

right click > Copy, right click > Paste, or

Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V. 

I would like to be able to draw a box around some tools, them maybe right mouse click to add them to a container

I use a mouse which has a horizontal scroll wheel. This allows me to quickly traverse the columns of excel documents, webpages, etc.

This interaction is not available in Alteryx Designer and when working with wide data previews it would improve my UX drastically. 

It is just a bit of annoyance, really. I'd like to see the option of inputting a hexcode of color and/or a screen color picker in the color dialog. At the moment, you have to change R, G, B separately or play around with the cursor to find the right color.

The color dialog is relevant for the documentation purposes but also reporting tools and I'm sure it would make life easier to some people, especially when branding colours are important.

It would be great if we could set the default size of the window presented to the user upon running an Analytic App. Better yet, the option to also have it be dynamically sized (auto-size to the number of input fields required).

Hello,

It appears that Alteryx does not accept .svg (or other vector image format) for icons (I think to custom macro icons), image in comment, etc...

I think that would be a great idea, especially to manage web integration and support of different resolutions.
here an example of a svg logo I made :


As you can see you can zoom in/out without loose quality.

I've recently been delving into using the interface tools and there are a couple of glaring issues for me as a developer/designer, all having to do with the UI, ironically (yes, I used that correctly!) with the interface tools. The irony here is that the interface tools utilise a poor user interface.

Firstly, I finished this video to ensure I was indeed doing things correctly, and I was.

The UI for designer's interface tools is incredibly sluggish. In order to rearrange tools, each time you create a new one, you have to push the up arrow for each tool and you have to traverse the groupings.

This will take forever. I counted 36 clicks.

Instead of this, I suggest two changes to the interface designer.

1. 1. Allow a control-click in the interface designer layout view so that multiple elements can be selected and they can traverse the groupings and be moved together. When one has, say 4 elements in 2 nested groupings, that is a lot of clicks to get your new element to the top. Having to do it with its radio-button partner: pretty much infuriating.
2. ONE at a time, children. No control-clicking. That would lead to pandemonium?Allow control-click in the tree view as well. The fact that we can only click one item at a time and move it one slot at a time is incredibly time consuming. It seems a no-brainer to at least allow a control-click here.
   • Bonus: Include the ability to jump to the top and/or pop out a level with left/right arrows in the tree interface. 

I know not everyone is building macros/apps and dealing with this, so I have little faith that this will jump to the top of your queue. But this is a painful part of the UI. I don't know if your UX designers could easily fix this or if it is more pain on your end than the pain you're giving me, but I just want to say: This hurts. 35 clicks every time I add a new element with no option to 'move to top' like you (wonderfully) do in the select tool is a big drag on my time (hint: maybe add that sort of functionality too; the select tool manages this stuff so well!). Which is supposedly valuable. In theory. But it certainly doesn't feel that way when I've spent 10 minutes clicking an up arrow (and yes, my UI is slow. And I may be exaggerating, but not by much!). 

Thank you for your continued improvement!

-Çædric Justice
Alteryx Developer
Cambia Healthcare

I think we would all benefit from having IntelliSense within Alteryx. Just think about how much quicker writing formulas wold be or any time you need to reference your data within the various tools.

Dear Users, Fans, Compatriots, and Fellow Alteryx Nerds:

One of my favourite parts of using Alteryx is that in all the in-memory tools, there is a quick-and-dirty count in each of your tools' output nodes. You know, you use these all the time and when you switch back into SQL, you get frustrated with having to run the query two or three times just to see the count in each of your join outputs. 

One thing I'm missing as an INDB user is that I have to employ a manual workaround to see what is happening. INDB tools are a bit black-box in that we don't see the counts.

All I want...

I've been using this workaround for a little over a year now and I haven't found it to be incredibly taxing on my resources, so I'm wondering if Alteryx may be able to look into doing this on the back end to make the INDB experience that much closer to the in-memory experience. I just want those numbers above; I don't need to know the byte count, just the record count.

What I need to do to get it

Now, I imagine this is not implemented already for a Very Good Reason. But, enough is enough! Let's shoot for the moon and make this tool all that much better!! Anyone with me?

-Cedric Justice

Cambia Healthcare

The sum function is probably the one I use most in the summarize tool. It is a silly thing, but it would be nice for "Sum" to be in the single-click list, rather than in the "Numeric" category...

Move sum function