Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

Containers are a great feature.  They allow us to create larger workflows in smaller canvases, and manage the flow and appearance of our work.  However the design whether intentional or flawed that allows the container window to interact with the layers behind it is annoying.  Connection wires should not redirect within a container because of things on the canvas behind the container.  Likewise if I have a container open, I should not be able to grab a tool or container behind the open container through the container canvas.  Please fix this flaw.

To embed the "Not ok" filter option in the browse tool

Looking for a tool to replicate the Goal seek functionality built into Excel.

Seems it could be solved by using R or iterative macros however a tool would make life much easier,

Currently, the "SQL editor" window only contain a box for typing text in, we could not see the schema and table on it's side as a reference, we need to jump back and force between "Visual Query Builder" and "SQL Editor" search for table and column names. If we could see the database schema and table in the SQL Editor interface, it will save us a lot of time.

Hello all,

As of today, if you have admin and non-admin version of Alteryx Designer installed on your computer, and install Business Intelligence Suite, you are able to run either version. It will not run both versions. This means whatever reason you installed admin and non-admin version, Business Intelligence Suite will run with only one Designer. 

I installed my computer Alteryx Designer 22.3 non-admin and 23.1 admin versions, both Predictive Analytics. I also installed BI Suite admin version, and BI suite non-admin version. Alteryx will uninstalled admin version, and kept non-admin version of the BI Suite. So, I can use BI Suite only with non-admin version now.

I'm bringing this idea for your vote to make available for both profiles/versions within Designer.

Thanks for voting

Similar to being able change the parameters of a tool using the interface tools, it could be very useful if Alteryx Designer had an option where the configuration of a tool can be modified by another tool's output (which can only consist of one row & column and may include line breaks/tab characters, only first row is used if there are multiple rows) while the workflow is running, therefore reducing the need to chain multiple apps.

This feature could be made possible as the "Control Containers" feature is now implemented, and it could work like below:

Suppose you need to write to a database and may need to specify a Pre-SQL statement or Query that needs to be dynamically changed by the result of a previous tool in the workflow.

In this case, as the configuration of a tool in the next container needs to be changed by the result of a previous formula, there would need to be an additional icon below the tools, indicating that the tool's result can be used for configuration change.

This icon which will appear below the tools will only be visible once at least one Control Container and an Action tool is added to the workflow, and will automatically be removed if all the control containers are removed from the workflow. User can change the configuration of the destination tool using an action tool, which must be connected to a tool in a container that will be run after the one it is contained in has finished running, as a tool (or several tools) that is contained in the next CC in the workflow needs to be dynamically modified before the container it is contained in is activated.

If a formula tool containing multiple formula fields is added to the action tool, the user will see all the formula outputs similar to connections (i.e. [#1], [#2]...) that can be used as a parameter.

The screenshot below demonstrates the idea, but please note that this is a change where adding an action tool may not mean that this workflow will need to become either a macro or an analytic app, so a new workflow type may or may not have to be defined, such as "Dynamic Configuration Workflow (YXDW)". Analytic Apps and Macros which utilize this feature could still be built without having to define a new workflow type.

As an Alteryx Designer user I would like the ability to write .hyper files to a subdirectory on Tableau Server to keep make my Tableau site easier to manage.

Providing user the ability to paste a tool with one of the three options regarding connections:

- Paste with Incoming Connections,

- Paste with Outgoing Connections (where applicable),

- Paste with Both Connections (where applicable)

could make it easier to configure the workflows where many incoming and/or outgoing connections are necessary for a specific source or target tool (i.e. a certain mapping table joined to several data streams in the same workflow after being modified with a formula tool to match with a specific stream).

It would be awesome if the Filter tool pre-populated info from your data so you could select what you want to filter by vs having to type it into a text field. When I filter data, I sometimes don't recall the exact word I'm needing to filter by. For example, if I'm needing to filter results for all Ground Operations data in the department column, I may have to look at the data to see if it's called Ground Operations, Ground Ops, GO, etc. I find myself having to use a summarize tool to see the different words in a specific field so I know how to specify it in the filter tool. 

My proposal is that the Filter tool displays all data options in the field for which you're filtering. So, if you're filtering the department field and there's 10 different departments in your data, those departments could display as selectable options in a dropdown menu.

Here's my example:

I want to filter for "Safety & Security" in the "medtype_name" field.

But, I don't remember if it is spelled with an ampersand or the word "and" or if it's abbreviated. I would have to look through the data in this column to find the specific way this word is listed so I know exactly how to write it in the filter tool. But if there are thousands of records, it would be hard to scroll through everything. So, I add a Summarize tool to group the different data points in this field. Then it is easy for me to scroll and find the one I'm looking for. Now I know exactly how to type the term into the Filter tool.

My idea is that the Filter tool does the work of the Summarize tool in that all data points in the specific field are shown in a dropdown, and you just select the one you want to filter by instead of having to write it in the text box. 

I searched but didn't see this idea, so please forgive me if it's already been mentioned.

Hello

Cartesian product is a common issue when joining dataset with a bad key. What I suggest is an option to check if there will be a cartesian product on the join tool.

-there is a label "Cartesian product (non join key uniqueness) detection"
-under it a drop down menu with three choices
-do nothing
-fail
-warning

Algo :
if do nothing==> well... do nothing more than actual behaviour.
if "fail" or "warning" : count distinct of join key versus count row on each side of the join. If none is unique, display a warning or an error message.

Best regards,

Simon

I find it extremely annoying having to individually disable/enable control containers in a workflow.  It would be nice if there was a way to select all control containers that I want to disable/enable and then be able to right click and do it quickly in one motion.  This would save me a lot of time when working with 10+ control containers.

Is it possible to add sort functionality to the Sample tool in Designer, similar to the 'Sample Based on Order' functionality in the Sample tool in Designer Cloud? This would cut down on the Sort + Sample tool combo in Designer!

Thanks!

Apologies if this has been suggested or exists. I often find myself using manual Excel files as a data source. These files frequently use cell formatting elements, such as cell color and text color, to convey important information. However, when these files are imported into Alteryx, this valuable formatting information is unfortunately lost.

To address this, a dedicated input tool that can read Excel files with separate fields for these formatting elements would be very helpful. This would be incredibly beneficial, especially when the data lacks other fields that relate to the coloring. Currently, I manage to achieve this using a Python tool, but integrating this as a built-in feature in Alteryx would undoubtedly be more efficient and user-friendly. This enhancement would not only simplify data preparation but also ensure the preservation of the full context of the original Excel file.

Hi is it possible to add sheet names (to spreedsheet files) to the output of a file directory tool

when you bring in a comment box or tool container to your canvas it should come in with your preferred defaults for  fill colors, font color & size, etc.  I have specific color schemes to identify what my comments are for and one scheme that I use most often has font size, position & color, and background color that I have to set every time i bring in a new comment box.

 I LOVE working in Alteryx it because unlike excel you set a "macro" to perform repeating operations once and then ignore them to do your real work.  This concept should extend to the little things within Alteryx, i.e. settings for preferred defaults for comment boxes & tool containers. 

Please update the Render tool to allow users to name the Excel sheet for the output. Alteryx currently errors when using same naming convention that works in normal Output tool.

Multi-Fill Tool

Please consider a new Multi-Fill tool, not for Apps, but for regular workflows, manually run or scheduled.

Similar to the Interface tool-combination of the Text Box & Action (Update value) tools, this Multi-Fill tool would enable the user to update, for example, the User Name and Password in one place for multiple Download tools. It could also be used to update other tool variables like Filter, Sort, Unique, etc.

Just like there is search bar for Select Tool, there should be one for Data Cleansing tool also.