Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

Hello

 

My problem: I've used the download-tool to download a 40mb XML. Parsing the DonwloadData-field containing this XML results in about 6600 records. The XML-Parse Tool passes the orginal DownloadData field to each record, resulting in quite a bit of memory usage:

 

 

XML-Parsing Problem

 

Suggestion: An option in the XML-parse Tool to not pass the parsed field in its output. 

 

Marco

When running an app on your desktop, nested radio buttons work wonderfully.  You can collapse groups and drill down to your heart's content.  If you promote the app to the gallery, it doesn't work.  I reported this as a bug to Client Services.  Their response leads me to believe that they designed it this way.  I'd like nested buttons to work both as a local app and as a gallery app.

 

Please star this idea if you agree...

 

Dear Mark,  

 

This email has been sent to confirm that your technical support ticket has been closed. Please contact us if you need any further assistance.

 

Case #: 00095540

Case Subject: Radio buttons- different functionality between Gallery and local version

 

 

Your comment:  

when using radio button to activate a sub set of questions that also use radio buttons then entire group has to be unselected then reselected to make additional change either activate/deactivate selectoins.

 

link to recorded webex that demonstrates issue: https://alteryx.webex.com/alteryx/lsr.php?RCID=740fd707be5e4654ba659f25713f8cdb

 

Can you add max and min options to the filter tool for date fields. Currently I have to use the sum function and join the max date back to the rest of the data and then filter. seems like an unnecessary amount of steps.

I would like a new format option within the Designer function DateTimeFormat such that where a date is held in the database

e.g. 2023-01-01

 

DateTimeFormat([date],%o)

 

will return 1st not 1 or 01. 

 

Workarounds exist, but are fiddly given the different options....1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th.....

Would love to have a 'common used' tab, rather than a favourties box (as that lags what I am currenty using).

 

Would be nice to have it look at my usage and create sort by frequency of use table. Could also be done with all users as well (some kind of opt-in telematary data?).

Pretty much only time I add Browse tools during development now is to get access to the Cell Viewer to examine values better. 

 

Would love to be able to do this on the output window

When I'm working with a new data or tool set, I'd find it helpful to know which tools other analysts are using.

I'm envisioning an optional, dockable window where a list of tools (and possibly percentage/probability rank) exist to suggest the next tool most users add after the selected tool (or blank canvas).

For example, I open a new workflow and the window shows the following suggestions of tools:

 

 

Next, I add a File Input.  While the File Input tool is selected, the list updates to show the most utilized tool after a File Input:

 

 

If I click back onto the blank canvas though, the suggestion window reverts to:

 

 

Ideally, there would be the option of the Community stats and/or your local server/enterprise stats.

 

 

 

It would be really great to have Dynamic Detour tool where you could specify the detour direction as an input to the tool rather than an imbedded control.

 

This would allow workflow branching.

 

Using a filter for this passes a dataset with no rows in it which causes dynamic in-db or dynamic input tools to error.

I am suggesting an addition to the Auto Field Tool.  Create an option that allows only auto sizing of the fields and does not change the field type.  A check box that says Auto Size Only.  The tool would recognize any fields that can be resized based on their incoming data field type and will not change the data type.  The resizing function is very helpful to maximize workflow performance, but I currently do not use it much because it guesses wrong on the data types.  This causes problems also when data inputs change.  Whereas setting to auto size only, it can streamline the data but let the user be confident the data types would not change. 

 

Thank You

In a multi-person BI team; or where you have a multitude of different flows hitting similar data - it's easy to loose track of the right connections; the right data sets etc.

 

Could we please add to the Alteryx toolset, the ability to:

- Register a set of connections with readable names

- Register a set of data-sets which are community managed.

 

Connection Registration:

I frequently connect to 5 different datastores to bring together analytical results.   Because Alteryx remembers the connections once-used I don't have to keep on building these connections from scratch, but these don't have a human-readable name; and they cannot be shared among the team to make workflow creation easier.

Suggestion: 

• Create the ability in Alteryx Designer to set up a data-store connection, with a human-readable name (e.g. "Timesheet Server").   
• Allow me to share this connection list with my team
• Allow me to either do pass-through password (i.e. don't save a password in the connection); or embed a password but make sure it's masked & encrypted so that the receiver cannot use this to get the password for the DB
• For enterprise customers - it would be great if I can connect to the enterprise connection store and use known good connections that way too...

 

Known Good Data Sets:

The other part of this is the community effect once a large number of people in the company start to get data-savvy.    for e.g. One person has found a good way to query the actual timesheet data (username; project; hours) - and another person has found a good way to query the HR systems to get user demographic information (username; location; contracted working hours).   

• Can we add to the Alteryx server, in the same way as Tableau and IBM Cognos / Watson have done; to allow users to publish a data-set connector which is known to work.
• That way - if I want timesheet data - I just browse the known good data-sets through Alteryx designer, and if I have questions I can go back to the connector owner
• additionally - the central administration team can then identify the ones that are certified as "golden source" or "clean; valid; governed data", and which ones are in a state of "user supplied - use at own risk"

 

For enterprise customers - this would transform alteryx from a stand-alone tool where everyone is re-inventing the wheel every time - to a Data Platform where each additional piece of work done increases the net value of the full ecosystem in a virtuous cycle.   It would also MASSIVELY accelerate every workflow build.

 

Happy to talk through this live with the Alteryx team if that's appropriate and helpful.

 

Thank you

Sean

 

 

I have tried to search for this Idea but not located one that is same or similar. 

 

When searching for tools to use rather than having to click in the search bar at the top, it would be nice just to click on a blank part of the canvas and start typing for the tool that you need, then a suggest tool list pops up and you just click on the one you want to it appear. 

 

Thanks

Session connection to Google Sheet exists for 60 minutes. If someone wanted to keep this for more time then "User Login" option requires re-entering credentials every 60 minutes.

 

However, we can use the Developer Login0 to bypass this limitation. This method requires sign-in using Google API credentials. This option requires obtaining a Client ID, Client Secret, and Refresh Token and does not require re-entering credentials to run a workflow.

 

My question - can you address this issue in next release of Alteryx?

I often search for a tool on the canvas using control find and the tool number. If the tool is already in the visible pane, Alteryx highlights the tool with a faint dotted box. The problem is that I often have hundreds of tools that are visible and I have to constantly hunt around the canvas to locate the highlighted tool. Please update the control find settings so that when you use control find, Alteryx centers the current view on that exact tool. That way your eye can scan the middle of the canvas and locate the tool every time without this wasted effort searching for the tool outline. 

 

 

 

I always get a chuckle out of seeing PowerPoint presentations which, through numerous tables and illustrations show the "health" of "x" - where "x" is a customer, a market, business division, etc. - where the author spent hours creating graphical indicators such as arrows to render trends.

 

Recalling being provided such a deck from a senior leader who was touting how precisely the deck drew attention to areas of needed action.  The deck, in this case, was a 6 figure investment from a consulting firm. My unwelcomed response was, "Pretty pictures, nice illustrations.  What happens when business shifts tomorrow and we need to see this updated?"  There was no response.

 

In a different past life, I had the opportunity to create a similar deck, but utilized PowerPoint's ability to link to Excel, and VBA that made the tables graphs - and trending arrows all dynamic based on the data.  

 

This feature request, however, is not about me.  The dynamic slide deck solution was a windfall.  Alteryx workflows can certainly push dynamic data into .xlsm files to lighten the burden on the .xslm by eliminating the data pull.

 

BUT - not many organizations care for having production .xlsm files in use, and they're difficult to governance control.

 

Would be GREAT if one of Alteryx's output options was:  A PowerPoint

Give the developer the same ability to render "pages" as one would to populate Worksheets in a Workbook.

 

Have to believe would be a game changer for the product.

I have used the SharePoint List Connectors with our SharePoint 2010 (on prem) instance for some time now. It works great and has become invaluable. Unfortunately, I have been told that these connectors do not work with a Cloud instance or an instance that is not on prem. We need this capability since Microsoft is pushing coporations to move to the cloud instance and there is talk that on-prem may not be available past the 2016 version that is coming soon. Many companies including mine have either completed or are close to completing a full migration which has rendered the current SharePoint Connectors useless. While this is the most important part, another piece that is missing is a SharePoint Document Library connector (similar to the Amazon S3 Download/Upload). Currently I must use the UNC path to my SharePoint folders and an easier more reliable way to save files out to OneDrive and SharePoint Online would be very beneficial.

When output is disabled, Alteryx's output tools are helpfully grayed out and include the message 'output has been disabled by the workflow properties.'

However, if a macro has an output, there is no visual indicator that output is disabled, even though the macro's output will also be suppressed by this workflow configuration.

Obviously, macros can be very complex, and could have both a file and a macro output, or have an optional file output, so these cannot be entirely locked out just because there is an output.

To that end, I suggest some other kind of color-coding/shading be applied visually to these tools, and that a message be added to the interface for these macros that says something like "output has been disabled, this macro may not perform all of its functions".

I just spent about 10 minutes debugging why a macro wasn't working properly in one workflow but was working in another, and it was because I had disabled output, which I wasn't thinking of because this particular macro uses the Render tool to produce a hyperlink.  I wouldn't have spent more than 30 seconds on this if there was some kind of visual indicator showing me what I was doing wrong!

I'm loving the ability to read from a zip file! However, I would love the ability to read all file types. For me, I don't see .accdb or .flat, and I assume other folks might be missing other file formats that they use. I find it confusing that the input tool accepts a lot of file types, but selecting the zip format then limits my choices. I believe @Aguisande mentioned this issue in the 10.5 beta.

 

Thanks!

It would be lovely if the Image tool supports GIFs when using the .PCXML and HTML options in the render tool.  Understandably, it would use it's .PNG format when using other render options, such as PDF etc.

The Explorer tool looks glitchy when you initially drop it on the canvas and I think its because it is trying to access the internet.  We already have temp folders in the Alteryx programs folder and it would be cool if the initial file reference is local- so its FAST.