Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

Idea: Allow the user to set the data type including character field width in the Text Input tool.

The Text Input tool currently auto-senses the correct type and width of the field in a Text Input tool. However, this sometimes restricts the usage of the data downline.

Examples:

1 - I often run into the situation where I've copied some data from a browse tool and then pasted that as an input to a new workflow. Then I'll turn that workflow into a macro. But then I run into an issue where the data that comes into the macro is larger than the original width in the Text Input tool. This causes problems.

2 - The tool senses that a field containing zip codes should be numeric and then converts the data. This corrupts the data and makes me insert a Select/Formula tool combo to pad the zeros to the left.

Please add official support for newer versions of Microsoft SQL Server and the related drivers.

According to the data sources article for Microsoft SQL Server (https://help.alteryx.com/current/DataSources/SQLServer.htm), and validation via a support ticket, only the following products have been tested and validated with Alteryx Designer/Server:

Microsoft SQL Server

Validated On: 2008, 2012, 2014, and 2016.

• No R versions are mentioned (2008 R2, for instance)
• SQL Server 2017, which was released in October of 2017, is notably missing from the list.
• SQL Server 2019, while fairly new (~6 months old), is also missing

This is one of the most popular data sources, and the lack of support for newer versions (especially a 2+ year old product like Sql Server 2017) is hard to fathom.

ODBC Driver for SQL Server/SQL Server Native Client

Validated on ODBC Driver: 11, 13, 13.1

Validated on SQL Server Native Client: 10,11

• ODBC Driver 17+ is not mentioned, even though it was released in February of 2018. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/connect/odbc/windows/release-notes-odbc-sql-server-windows?view...
• SQL Server Native Client is deprecated. It is being replaced by Microsoft OLE DB Driver for SQL Server. However, there is not a mention of Microsoft OLE DB Driver for SQL Server. The latest version of this is 18.3.0. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/connect/oledb/release-notes-for-oledb-driver-for-sql-server?vie...

Hello,

According to wikipedia :

A partition is a division of a logical database or its constituent elements into distinct independent parts. Database partitioning is normally done for manageability, performance or availability reasons, or for load balancing. It is popular in distributed database management systems, where each partition may be spread over multiple nodes, with users at the node performing local transactions on the partition. This increases performance for sites that have regular transactions involving certain views of data, whilst maintaining availability and security. 

Well, basically, you split your table in several parts, according to a field. it's very useful in term of performance when your workflows are in delta or when all your queries are based on a date. (e.g. : my table helps me to follow my sales month by month, I partition my table by month).

So the idea is to support that in Alteryx, it will add a good value, especially in In-DB workflows.

Best regards,

Simon

Who needs a 1073741823 sized string anyways?  No one, or close enough to no one.  But, if you are creating some fancy new properties in the formula tool and just cranking along and then you see that your **bleep** data stream is 9G for nine rows of data you find yourself wondering what the hell is going on.  And then, you walk your way way down the workflow for a while finding slots where the default 1073741823 value got set, changing them to non-insane sized strings, and the your data flow is more like 64kb and your workflow runs in 3 seconds instead of 30 seconds.  

Please set the default value for formula tools to a non-insane value that won't be changed by default by 99.99999% of use cases.  Thank you.

Hey YXDB Bosses,

Let's move forward with our YXDB.  Maybe give AMP a real edge over e1.  Here are some things that could may YXDB super-powered:

• Metadata
  • Workflow information about what created that poorly named output file.
  • When was the file originally created/updated.
  • SORT order.  If there is a sort order for the data, what is it?
• Other stuff
  • INDEX.  Currently you get spatial indexes (or you can opt out).  If I want to search through a 100+MM record file, it is a sequential read of all of the data.  With an index I could grab data without the expense of a calgary file creation.  Don't go crazy on the indexing option, just allow users to set 1+ fields as index (takes more time to write).  
  • I'm sure that you've been asked before, but CREATE DIRECTORY if the output directory doesn't exist.
• Old School - Crazy Idea
  • Generation Data Groups (GDG)
    This will likely make @NicoleJ 's eyes roll 🙄 but back in the days, we could write our data to the SAME filename and the old data became 1 version older.  You could read the (0) version of the file or read from 1, 2, 3 or more previous versions of the data using the same name (e.g. .\Customers|||3).  The write of the output file would do all of the backing up of the data (easy to use) and when the initial defined limit expires, the data drops off.

Just a little more craziness from me

cheers

Hello all,

A few weeks ago Alteryx announced inDB support for GBQ. This is an awesome idea, however to make it run, you should use Oauth2 Authentication means GBQ API should be enabled. As of now, it is possible to use Simba ODBC to connect GBQ. My idea is to enhance the connection/authentication method as we have today with Simba ODBC for Google BigQuery and support inDB. It is not easy to implement by IT considering big organizations, number of GBQ projects and to enable API for each application. By enhancing the functionality with ODBC, this will be an awesome solution.

Thank you for voting

Albert

Apologies if this has been suggested already - did a search and didn't see anything similar.

This is a quality of life/UX idea. The search functionality in the results pane essentially does a 'contains' search on all of the columns (see below screenshots for the filter inserted by the 'apply data manipulations button). As I build workflows and profile the data, it'd be helpful if I could click one or more columns and limit the search bar to just those fields.

Right now, depending on the dataset I could get rows returned by the search due to the search term appearing in columns that aren't relevant. To workaround this I could add select tools to limit the columns or do more robust filters in a filter tool, but having it built in would be very helpful.

It would be nice to be able to concatenate numeric values (integers, doubles, etc.) directly in the Summarize Tool.

I know this would involve converting it to a string on the backend, but I don't believe there would be any data loss when going from numeric to string. I know this can be done by using other tools like Select of Formula to convert to string before the summarize but I don't see any reason why this couldn't be accomplished in a single tool.

Thanks,

Paul

After I type something into the filter box, I should be able hit enter and then it just applies my change (ie enter hits the apply button). It used to be this way, but it's not working as of 2021.2. This feels like a very tiny move in the wrong direction. Currently enter does nothing. It looks like if I hit tab twice and then enter, it finds the apply button. I shouldn't have to hit tab twice. 

cc: @Hollingsworth @A11yKyle 

Trying to solve some use cases, I realized that I had to simulate the factorial behaviour.

Having a factorial formula can make this process easier.

Thanks!

Please add ablity to globally, within a module, forget all missing fields.

When I import an Excel file in to Alteryx I get an error: “shared strings root=x:sst” and Alteryx cannot read the file.

I can work around this by manually opening and saving the excel before importing it into Alteryx but this is not ideal, especially considering the automation implications.

I believe this may be happening because the XLSX generated by the source of the report has a prefix “x:” in all the tags in the Shared String XML embedded in Excel. See: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/office/open-xml/working-with-the-shared-string-table 

Essentially, it would appear Alteryx is not able to read generated Excel sheets which has the prefix "x:" (e.g. from a bot). The second file which has been opened and saved in Excel manually can be read by Alteryx correctly.

Example of file as exported from ”BOT”:

How the same file looks once it is manually opened and saved:

Ideally Alteryx would read the file as is, i.e. with the "X:SST" tag seen above as having to manually open and save the excel before it can be read is rather clunky.

Thanks!

We all love seeing this.  And, it's fairly easy to fix, just go find the macro and insert a new copy.  But, then you have to remember the configuration and hope that it was simple. 

With the tool that's there, the XML still contains the configuration, all that's missing is the tool path.    It would be great to be able to right click and repair the path from the context of the missing macro.

For in-DB use, please provide a Data Cleansing Tool.

When you have a "reminder"/"Notification" , there needs to be the option to permanently ignore the update.  

Some updates only give you a timeframe for ignore/remind as little as 7 days. There should absolutely be options for longer time frames, and should include a permanent reminder of do not display/remind me of 'this' update again. 

Fine for another reminder when there is another new update, but don't repeatedly place the notice of a reminder for the same system/version/data set etc etc etc update. 

There are times companies don't provide updates for a year or more. You shouldn't have to keep dismissing update reminders/notices when you don't intend to update until maybe the next version or a year from now. 

Remove the constant update notification. 

When creating a connection using DCM (example being ODBC for SQL) - the process requires an ODBC Data Source Name (see screenshot 1 below).

However, when you use the alias manager (another way to make database connections) - this does allow for DSN-free connections which are essential for large enterprises (see screenshot 2 below).    

NOTE: the connection manager screens do have another option - Quick Connect - which seems to allow for DSN-free connections, but this is non-intuitive; and you're asked to type in the name of the driver yourself which seems to be an obvious failure point (especially since the list of all installed drivers can be read straight from the registry)

Please could we change DCM to use the same interfaces / concepts as the alias screens so that all DCM connections can easily be created without requiring an ODBC DSN; and so that DSN-free connections are the default mode of operation?

Screenshot 1: DCM connection:

screenshot 2

cc: @wesley-siu  @_PavelP @ToddTarney 

when you render out to an excel file, the excel file is created as a new file.  You cannot render to an existing excel file.

I'd like to see this functionality.  I have a client who has a workbook with multiple formatted sheets and they'd like to render an addiitional sheet of formatted data out from Alteryx into the existing workbook.

Please consider implementing a consistent case-sensitive option for all tools and functions.

To compare string values, including case-sensitivity:   This post had a good description of the challenge, but the post has been archived:

   https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/IF-equation-ignoring-case-BUG/m-p/4170...

   For all the time I've used Alteryx, I thought that IF "test" = "TEST" would evaluate to false. Today I realised that isn't the case and I was surprised. I'm very surprised that "equals" performs like it does.

A few existing Ideas request case-sensitivity for individual tools:

   Case insensitive option while joining two data sets
   https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Desktop-Ideas/Case-insensitive-option-while-joinin...

   Unique tool enhancement - deal with case sensitive data
   https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Desktop-Ideas/Unique-tool-enhancement-deal-with-ca...

This new Idea requests system-wide consideration for case-sensitivity, for all tools and functions.

Current state:

These tools and functions are case-sensitive:

• Tool: Join
• Tool: Tile
• Function: FindString
• Functions: MD5_ASCII, MD5_UNICODE, MD5_UTF8

These tools and functions are NOT case-sensitive:

• Tool: Unique
• Function: CompareDictionary

These tools and functions can be either case-sensitive or NOT case-sensitive, depending on the options used:

• Function: Contains
• Function: EndsWith
• Function: StartsWith
• Functions: REGEX_Match, REGEX_Replace, REGEX_CountMatches

Current Challenges:

   How do we easily identify Lower Case, Upper Case, Mixed Case?

   How do we easily compare strings for equality, using case sensitivity?

Request:

   Ensure all tools and functions include an option to ignore or consider Case

   Create new functions for IsUpperCase, IsLowerCase, IsMixedCase

   Create a new function for IsEqual, with an option to ignore or consider Case

See attached workflow, which

• uses REGEX_Match to create 3 new fields: IsUpperCase, IsLowerCase, IsMixedCase
• creates a field [Flag: Original value IsEqual, case-sensitive], to compare strings for equality, using case sensitivity

A common problem with the R tool is that it outputs "False Errors" like the following: "The R.exe exit code (4294967295) indicted an error"

I call this a false error because data passes out of the R script the same as if there were no error. As such, this error can generally be ignored. In my use case, however, my R tool is embedded within an iterative macro, and the error causes the iterator to stop running.

I was able to create a workaround by moving the R tool to a separate workflow and calling it from the CReW runner macro within my iterator, effectively suppressing the error message, but this solution is a bit clumsy, requires unnecessary read/writes, and uses nonstandard macros.

I propose the solution suggested by @mbarone (https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Boosted-Model-Error/td-p/5509) to only generate an error when the R return code is 1, indicating a true error, and to either ignore these false errors or pass them as warnings. This will allow R scripts and R-based tools to be embedded within iterative macros without breaking.