Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

I'm adding a 'Dynamic Input' tool to a macro that will dynmaically build the connection string based on User inputs. We intend to distribute this macro as a 'Connector' to our main database system.

 

However, this tool attempts to connect to the database after 'fake' credentials are supplied in the tool, returning error messages that can't be turned off.

 

In situations like this, I think you'd want the tool to refrain from attempting connections. Can we add a option to turn off the checking of credentials? I assume that others who are building the connection strings at runtime would also appreciate this as well.

 

As a corollary, for runtime connection strings, having to define a 'fake' connection in the Dynamic Input tool seems redundant, given we have already set the 'Change Entire File Path' option. There are some settings in the data connection window that are nice to be able to set at design time (e.g. caching, uncommitted read, etc.), but the main point of that window to provide the connection string is redundant given that we intend to replace it with the correct string at runtime. Could we make the data connection string optional?

 

To combine the above points, perhaps if the connection string is left blank, the tool does not attempt to connect to the connection string at runtime.

When I first started using Alteryx I did not use macros or the Runtime Tab much at all and now I use both a lot but...I can't use them together. 

 

When working in a macro there is no Runtime Tab. While working on a macro and testing it you can't take advantage of any of the handy features in the Runtime Tab.  I am assuming a macro will inherit any settings from the Flow that calls it, can't find anything in the community or "help" to confirm that though, but this is not helpful while developing and testing.

There is currently no way to export interactive output from the network graph tool. I would like to be able to export a png of the static network graph image, a pdf of the report, and a complete html of the whole (which means including the JSON and vis.js files necessary for creating the report).

 

 

Dynamic macros that fetch the current version at every run time vs storing a static copy of the macro with the workflow at publish time are challenging to pull off using shared drives. 

 

This suggestion is to store dynamic macros in the gallery and secure their use with collections.

 

Would be nice to have a place where general use macros or packages could be published by the community and then used within the designer.

Thinking of something along the lines of the NuGet package manager: https://www.nuget.org/
 

This should be quite easy to implement. I think it would be great if could we have:

1. A User repository for macros in the Users folder, e.g. My DocumentsMy Alteryx Macros

This would make it easier to install macros without needing any administrator rights

2. A right click operation on a yxmc file (or a menu operation in Alteryx) that Install the macro ie. will move any macro into the folder above.

This would make it very simple to show new users how to install any macro you send them

Both these ideas will make it easier for partners and the Alteryx user community to share macros.
 

Hi,

 

when I right-click on an Input tool, I can select "Convert To Macro Input" from the context menu. I would like the similar functionality when right-clicking a Browse tool to "Convert To Macro Output".

The "Detour" tool is incredibly useful in Macros. However, it really isn't much use in the normal workflow area.

 

We need a "Detour" tool suitable for normal Workflow (not from within a Macro) which would greatly aid in workflow controls and logic.

Here is a thought I posted about on my Alteryxuser blog: http://alteryxuser.blogspot.com/2015/02/alteryx-and-github-place-for-sharing.html. I interested in hearing your comments!

Idea:

A funcionality added to the Impute values tool for multiple imputation and maximum likelihood imputation of fields with missing at random will be very useful.

 

Rationale:

Missing data form a problem and advanced techniques are complicated. One great idea in statistics is multiple imputation,

filling the gaps in the data not with average, median, mode or user defined static values but instead with plausible values considering other fields.

 

SAS has PROC MI tool, here is a page detailing the usage with examples: http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/sas/seminars/missing_data/mi_new_1.htm

Also there is PROC CALIS for maximum likelihood here...

 

Same useful tool exists in spss as well http://www.appliedmissingdata.com/spss-multiple-imputation.pdf

 

Best

Currently there is no option to edit an existing macro search path from Options-> User Settings -> Macros. Only options are Add / Delete. Ideally we need the Edit option as well.

 

Existing Category needs to be deleted and created again with the correct path, if search path is changed from one location to another.

 

 

There is an irony in asking for what is essentially the Alteryx version of 'Formula Wizard' from Excel

 

As great as the guides have been in the community, the Batch Macro is one of most difficult to repeat and explain.

 

It would be great for users to have a prompt that recognises a Directory input of excel files and at the point of adding a Macro, having a series of prompts at each stage help build out the desired result (whether that be returning all sheets or specific sheets).

 

It would further highlight one the great features & key enablers of Alteryx 

"Enable Performance Profiling" a great feature for investigating which tools within the workflow are taking up most of the time.This is ok to use during the development time.

It would be ideal to have this feature extended for the following use cases as well:

 

• Workflows scheduled via the scheduler on the server
• Macros & apps performance profiling when executed from both workstation as well as the scheduler/gallery

 

Regards,

Sandeep.

 

 

When building macros - we have the ability to put test data into the macro inputs, so that we can run them and know that the output is what we expected.    This is very helpful (and it also sets the type on the inputs)

 

However, for batch macros, there seems to be no way to provide test inputs for the Control Parameter.   So if I'm testing a batch macro that will take multiple dates as control params to run the process 3 times, then there's no way for me to test this during design / build without putting a test-macro around this (which then gets into the fact that I can't inspect what's going on without doing some funkiness)

 

Could we add the same capability to the Control Parameter as we have on the Macro Input to be able to specify sample input data?

Think of a pivot table on steroids. In my industry, "strats" are commonly used to summarize pools of investment assets. You may have several commonly used columns that are a mix of sums and weighted averages, capable of having filtering applied to each column. So you may see an output like this:

 

Loan Status	Total Balance	% of Balance	% of Balance (in Southwest Region)	Loan to Value Ratio (WA)	Curr Rate (WA)	FICO (WA)	Mths Delinquent (WA)
Current	$9,000,000	90	80	85	4.5	720	0
Delinquent	$1,000,000	10	100	95	5.5	620	4
Total	$10,000,000	100	90	86	4.6	710	0.4

 

Right now, I feel like to create the several sums and weighted averages, it's just too inefficient to create all the different modules, link them all together and run them through a transpose and/or cross tab. And to create a summary report where I may have 15 different categories outside of Loan Status, I'd have to replicate that process with those modules 15 times.

 

Currently, I have a different piece of software where I can simply write out sum and WA calcs for each column, save that column list (with accompanying calcs) and then simply plug in a new leftmost category for each piece of data I'm looking at. And I get the Total row as well auto-calculated as well. 

Never noticed this, because I always use the custom filter option, not the basic.  But I had a user come to me asking why his app wasn't updating his filter properly.

 

He configured the filter tool thusly (dummy data):

 

And here is the what the action tool looks like when you connect it to the filter tool:

So he simply highlighted the "Bob" line and picked to update "Bob".

 

However, since he used a basic filter, and not a custom one, this is how he should've configured the action tool:

I realize that "well, it's spelled out for you - there's an expression section & a simple section in the action tool".  But for beginners or even non-beginners, it might not be obvious.

 

It would be nice if when you connect the action too, it only displayed the appropriate option (either custom or simple, but not both).

When developing modules and looking to refactor/improve areas where tools should be placed into a macro (for re-use, or for module cleanliness), it would be nice if I could simply select all the tools that should be in the macro, right click, and have an option to "Create as Macro". The option would create a new module/macro, copy the tools to the canvas, and create the necessary macro inputs and outputs automatically. Additionally, the original module could be updated to replace the selected tools with the newly created macro.

Problem : when I develop a macro, I often change the configuration in the "Template input" part of the "Macro Input" tool from "Text Input" to "File Input".

Doing that loses the previous data : moving from "Text Input" to "File Input" removes the data entered and moving from "File Input" to "Text Input" removes the pointer to the file.

Which is annoying.

 

Solution : keep the data or file pointer in the "Template Input" so that it doesn't disappear when changing configuration choice.

Hello gurus - 

 

I think it would be an important safety valve if at application start up time, duplicate macros found in the 'classpath' (i.e., https://help.alteryx.com/current/server/install-custom-tools, ) generate a warning to the user.  I know that if you have the same macro in the same folder you can get a warning at load time, but it doesn't seem to propagate out to different tiers on the macro loading path.  As such, the developer can find themselves with difficult to diagnose behavior wherein the tool seems to be confused as to which macro metadata to use.   I also imagine someone could also arrive at a situation where a developer was not using the version of the macro they were expecting unless they goto the workflow tab for every custom macro on their canvas.  

 

Thank you for attending my TED talk on the upsides of providing warnings at startup of duplicate macros in different folder locations.