Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

If I have a .zip file with multiple files of the same format and layout included, would like to be able to have those read in with 1 input tool.  I also have several large national files split by state that are zipped separately in a folder, so it would be nice to have the ability to use the wildcard functionality in 1 input tool to read all separate files.

We are enjoying the new functionality of pointing to a .zip file in the input data tool and reading in .csv files without having to manually unzip the file.  We process a lot of SQlite files so having that as an option would be great.  We also have several clients that supply .zip flat fixed lenght files with 100+ fields that we have mapped and having the functionality to use the Flat File Layout tool and Import the mapping file that has already been completed would be very helpful also.  The current workaround is to read in as a csv with \0 as the delimiter but we then have to substring to parse each field and rename.

We often build very large Alteryx projects that breakdown large data processing jobs into multiple self contained workflows.

We use CReW Runner tools to automate running the workflows in sequence but it would be nice if Alteryx supported this natively with a new panel for "Projects"

Nice features for Projects could be:

• Set the sequence
• Conditional sequence
• Error handling
• Shared constants
• Shared aliases
• Shared dependencies
• Chained Apps
• Option to pass data between workflows - Input from yxmd Output - no need to persist intermediary data
• Input/output folder/project folder setups for local data sources in dependencies window
• Ability to package like "Export Workflow" for sharing
• Results log the entire project

Development can get super slow for larger workflows with the automatic syntax checking.  Would be nice to flip to "Pro Mode" that pauses the syntax checking until either un-paused or a run is kicked off to save on the wait time between tools during development and more particularly going back to make numerous changes.

Modify the taskbar icon while according to workflow status to provide a visual queue when workflows are running/completed, like the SAS running man or the Teradata sunglasses... The Alteryx A could be going places.

I'll admit it, I'm a coder, a keyboard guy, a sublime text typing junkie; but I love Alteryx.  Currently if I open a new workflow and start typing what happens? nothing... Wa wa.  Now lets imagine I'm already pretty familiar with Alteryx and I'm 5 moves ahead of my click and drag. 

Wouldn't it be wonderful if I could click a whitespace and start typing?  Typing would bring up a context menu search with tools found by the search (similar to the "search all tools" in the upper left corner, but next to the cursor, and vertical).  I could continue typing until one tool was left or select a tool using my cursor keys. Hitting 'Enter' would insert the tool where I had originally clicked and open another tool search window, selecting the next tool would automagically connect the two and on down the line (if multiple leg outputs exist for the tool the context menu would appear allowing me to select the leg I want it to connect to, hitting Enter would again bring up the tool search...

Now get this, go back to just after my first search... if instead of Enter I hit the "Tab" key, boom, it would take me to the configuration panel and allow me to fill in/tab through the configuration.  Hit enter again and I'm off to the races with another tool search.

All you click and draggers don't lose any functionality, and we keyboarders can swiftly race through development with ease.  How about that?  (the standard syntax check/path validation would need to be paused to keep development quick until I clicked again on the workflow which would execute the Rapid development mode.)

Having the ability to minimize the toolbar would allow more screen space.  Once minimized, the tools should display when you hover over the tool category tab.

Currently, the results window returns varying column widths, not related to the width of the data.  We are able to select an individual column and double click the edge to auto fit the column to the data.  It would be helpful to have all columns automatically fit, and allow us to select multiple columns to adjust at the same time.

I'm looking to optimize how we allocate licenses at our organization.

Seeing who has a registered license via the public Gallery has been helpful; but is there a way we can quantify usage?

Possibly a tool usage or an overall workflow run count?

I have a dual monitor setup. My canvas lives on the left monitor, and I combine tool config and results on the right monitor. I've noticed that it's incredibly difficult to resize the config vs results window size. This is because you have to hover over EXACTLY the right part of the divider until the resize icon appears, as below:

The difficulty arises because the target zone, over which the cursor changes from an arrow to the resize tool, is only 1 pixel wide. If you have a high resolution screen, or a slightly fiddly mouse, it's almost impossible to successfully hover over the correct place. Please consider increasing the width of the hover zone to facilitate window resizing. I hope I've explained this adequately, please let me know if I need to amend. Thanks!

I noticed that Tableau has a new connector to Anaplan in the upcoming release. 

Does Alteryx have any plans to create an Anaplan connector? 

I find that when I'm using Alteryx, I'm constantly renaming the tool connectors. Here's my logic, most of the time:

I have something like a Join and 3 browses.

1. I name the L join something like "L: on product/location join"
2. I then copy that descriptor, and past it in the Annotation field
3. I then copy that descriptor, select the wired connector, and paste that in the connection configuration

MY VISION:

Have a setting where I could select the following options:

• Automatically annotate based on tool rename
• Automatically rename incoming connector based on tool rename

THE GUTS/REQUEST:

If I rename a tool, and "Automatically annotate based on tool rename" is enacted, it will insert that renaming at the top of the annotation field. If there is already data in that field, it will be shifted down. If I rename a tool and "Automatically rename incoming connector..." is on, then the connection coming into it gets [name string]+' connection' put into its name field. I included a picture of the end game of my request.

Thanks for your ear!

I'm still relatively new, so I trust someone will correct and instruct me if this already exists. I have looked and have not been able to find it.

It would be nice if there was an option to return the standard 2 letter abbreviations for states from the Allocate Input tool's "Pick Variables" "geographic Identifiers." Currently, the only identifiers available are "Key" an"Name":

Where, Key is numeric ("02", "44", etc.), and Name is the full state Name. In order to join to most of our databases, I usually need this to be the standard 2 letter abbreviation. This forces me to join to another database table to translate it.

Sometimes when I'm working on a workflow a connection string between two tools will take a path that either causes the workflow to become more cluttered or overlaps another tool etc. I usually format these strings to be wireless but if I am presenting my workflow to someone who is unfamiliar with Alteryx, wireless connections can cause much confusion. It would be great if I could determine the path a connection string takes, much the same way you can draw/manipulate a line in ppt or word (i.e. if the string could have nodes that could be dragged around tools, containers, etc.)

Thanks!

Countless times I've been asked by management how long a process will take to run and I really can't say beyond an educated guess (using input file size and complexity of workflow). Yet, when downloading files off the internet or moving files around in a network, Microsoft will give an estimated time of completion (e.g. 10 minutes remaining till files are downloaded). It would be so great if Alteryx would show something similar with regard to how long a workflow will take to finish running. Not sure if you can create an algoithm based on the nubmer of tools, import file size, network connection etc. to give a ETA on when a workflow may finish running but it would be super helpful for me when working on high priortity project so I can communicate with the business side.

Thanks!

Some say to mato and some say to_mato, but how about:  to/mato?

While working with my new friend, @Cedric we ran across a field in his data that contained a '/' character.  We were building a macro where we updated the value of the field [AB/CD] with another field selected from the incoming data.  Our error message was something akin to:  Field AB was not found.

We worked around the issue, but what remained was the fact that certain characters are permitted in field names within some aspects of Alteryx and not in others.  I don't know if you're aware of this limitation.  

Cheers,

Mark

@MarcH I'm putting your name on this one:

Yesterday I was working with @Cedric via WebEx and we were building a macro together.  We were making several field substitutions and and Cedric stated the obvious, "Alteryx should make this easier".

Contains([Field_X],"XYZ")

He would double click [Field_X] and the result is a partial selection:  [Field_X].   The brackets don't get selected.

I'm sure that there is a good explanation for why this happens, it just doesn't make the UX wonderful.

Cheers,

Mark

It would be nice if when Alteryx crashes there is an autosave capability that when you re-open Alteryx it shows you the list of workflows that were autosaved and give you the immediate option to select which ones you want to save. SImilar to what Excel does.

I know about the current autosave feature, but I would still like to have it pop up or the option to have it pop up for me to select which to keep and which to discard.