Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

Running into an issue when typing from keyboard to make a selection in some dropdown lists found in tool configurations. I've replicated it in the Join, Join Multiple, and Filter tools. (Sort tool worked as expected.)  Running version 10.6.

 

• Join tool configuration.
• From "Left" dropdown start typing to select a column.
• Click off the "Left" dropdown (into "Right" for example).
• Notice that your selection in "Left" is maintained.
• Now click on another tool or in the cavas.
• Click back to the Join tool. Notice that the "Left" selection has reverted to the original field and your typed selection is lost.
• Note: you can "commit" your selection by hitting "Enter" after typing, but I don't think this extra step should be required (as evidenced by the Sort tool).

This small mis-step can have SIGNIFICANT impact if a developer assumes their join field selection was set correctly, but in fact it changed without them noticing and is resulting in incorrect joins.

 

See attached video for quick walkthrough.

Problem: When you configure fields manually in the union control and then go back to remove a field it throws up an error that "XYZ field missing"
Solution: One needs to change the config to "arrange fields by name" then refresh before you can arrange fields manually

I would like this problem to be handled by some method that tracks for changes and warns the user rather than throw an error.

When building join operations in Alteryx, it can be time-consuming to manually scroll through long lists of fields to find the right one to join on, especially when working with large datasets or unfamiliar schemas.

It would be great to have a search-as-you-type filter in the Join tool’s field selection interface. Similar to the existing field selector search, this feature would allow users to start typing a field name and instantly see a filtered list of partial matches. This would significantly speed up the process of identifying and selecting the correct join fields and reduce the risk of selecting incorrect fields due to visual clutter.

Allow the user to select which type of Join is happening in the join tool. Allow the J anchor to output the join type within a radio option in the tool configuration. Right now the J anchor outputs matches in both inputs. New suggestion would allow the user to select a Right Outer or Left Outer join without having to use a Union tool after the Join.

For tools that have 2 input or output anchors, the ability to right-click the tool and select "swap connections" to swap the connections coming out of the 2 input or output anchors. Let's say, with 5 connections coming out of the Unique's U Anchor and 3 coming out of the D anchor, we need to disconnect and reconnect connections 8 times in order to switch everything between U and D. Even if the tool has 1 connection per anchor, this would still be faster than removing + connecting each connection manually. Tool examples include Append data, Join, Unique, Macros with 2 inputs or outputs, etc.

The Find and Replace tool currently replaces text or appends fields by reviewing the first word in the string and evaluating if there is a matching value in the lookup replace table. If there is, it returns the replace text or it continues onto the next word in the string and repeats until a match is found or not found.

 

However the functionality should be that the entire string is evaluated and the first match in the replace lookup table is returned. This is similar to how the VLOOKUP formula functions in Excel. 

This makes workflows easier to maintain as the ordering of the lookup table can be amended to return the appropriate value. The ordering of the source string is far trickier to automate/change. 

 

I have seen workarounds where append fields is used to append all lookup values to each row and then find rows which contain the string and use a sample tool to return the first row, however this causes processing issues when working with large number of records/ lookup values.

 

The functionality should either be changed or at least a setting which can be toggled to switch between the two options.

Have Alteryx have different colored lines for the different paths that come in and go out from a tool like how Excel colors references in a formula.

Hi,

 

I was thinking that this might be nice addition - while Joining two inputs at the bottom there is always possibility to check if we want to include Unknown columns. Maybe we could specify if we want to join Unknown columns only from Right Input or Unknown only from Left Input. I know I would use this in my workflows. 

 

Thanks

Alicja

The find and replace tool currently does not run row by row, and finds anything in the find column, and replaces it with anything in the replace column. I was under the impression and designed my workflow to use this as a row by row find and replace, not entire columns. 

 

A simple fix would be to allow users to group by RecordID, which should also speed up the find / replace tool for larger data sets I would imagine.

 

What I am going to do in the meantime is use Regex to replace the word out.

 

Thanks!

The Find/Replace Tool in the Join tools is set to "Find Any Part of Field".

 

However, 99% of time, I select the "Entire Field", hence would like there to be a way to have the Entire Field checked as my standard box filled in.

 

It would be nice if Alteryx knew which field is most likely what I will use, based on always checking that box, or for none of them to be selected, to make sure I will select the correct one.

 

Most of the times when I have a mistake its because of this tool and it being set to "Any Part of Field" and I missed to change it.

 

Would imagine most people use this tool to find an exact match?

Please enhance the Join Multiple tool to include an option of:

 

"left outer join all on input 1".

 

Such a tool would be massively advantageous when data granularity is defined by one dataset (input 1) and many subsequent tables just need to be joined onto that input.

 

As-is, I have had to manually perform dozens of join + union sequences which seems both untidy and inefficient.

 

Such a feature would likely be more useful than existing options of full outer joins / inner joins which currently the tool allows.

I think this was brought up a few years back but why doesn't the Union config by name  option have a field map? It would stop that feeling you get when you browse your workflow after a union tool and find a column which is 5% blank and 95% full sitting next to one with a slightly different name which is 95% blank and 5% full.

While doing Find replace with the following settings,

The output limits to the number of characters comes with "Replace source". If the number of characters in "Replace  Found Text With Value" is more than the source then it will truncate the value to source. I feel it's not correct. 

 

Suggesting, that there should be an option to overwrite the "field size" or keep as it coming from source.

With the Join Multiple tool, a connector line isn't colored correctly all the way to the input anchor.

I'm on version 2019.4

 

Example:  My Join Multiple has 4 inputs

 

When I click the output anchor on a Select tool that feeds into Input #1 in the Join Multiple, the connector is colored blue for only a portion of the distance to the Join Multiple tool.

 

 

 

Example: When I click the input anchor on the Join Multiple, the connector line isn't blue all the way to the prior Select tool.

 

 

 

Example of how the incorrect coloring can be confusing:

 

When the two tools are aligned horizontally, clicking the Select tool makes it look like it's not connected to the Join Multiple.

 

 

 

And clicking the Join Multiple makes it look like it's not connected to the Select.

 

 

 

Chris

In the Union Field, we have the option to manually configure fields.  This is currently done horizontally, which makes it difficult to see every field (if dealing with lots of columns), if we could have a tick-box, and switch this to vertical, then we could use a view similar to the select field. 

 

Thanks

Sam7

Hello,

 

I really apologized if this has been posted before with some other title.

 

I started with Alteryx month ago and I am really trying to replicate some cool stuff for which we used to write ETL code in Python and loved it.

 

I saw a lot of posts regarding a Join Tool for left outer join or right outer join. While using Alteryx as a new person even I was confused with the Join tool since I was missing on numbers and ratios then I used Union Tool to union left and inner anchor of the output for the desired output.

 

I believe there should be a checkbox in the Join Tool for the Union Tool option.

 

I know its just a matter of dragging one more tool on Canvas but this is regarding with more flexibility and ease of use for every Alteryx user.

 

Thank you.

 

Regards,

Owais

This is an edge case in which I have two back to back Union tools. I want to Delete and Connect Around on the first one. All of the inputs into that Union will flow into the next Union tool. Delete and Connect Around is not available from the context menu for any tool with multiple inputs. See the image for more clarification.

 

 

 

 

When using the Select Tool or the Join Tool and adding data from multiple data sources, I would love to see an option to color code a data field to match the data source it was derived from.  It would make it much easier to determine you are selecting the correct data field later in a workflow, especially when the multiple data sources have the same data field names.

The Join tool is one of the most used in the Community. After delivering some training for new users (Not technical) I see that it's difficult for them understands some some Joins, specially when the relationship between  the Sources it's not 1:1.

 

So I propose to show the Summary visually, extending the Browse current information:

 

- List of Left Fields Joined / Excluded

- List of Right Fields Joined / Excluded

 

Also It should be convenient a tool to analyze the potential relationship between the sources, to be used previous to Join...

 

Thanks!