Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

We frequently have issues where users report slowness from an Alteryx installation on a particular machine; or where a specific tool or package fails to install correctly.

For our admin teams - this becomes a debugging exercise to go through different permutations to understand the cause - and if this is escallated to Alteryx Support, this becomes even tougher.

Could we think about including a basic "Self Diagnostic" in to Alteryx which runs through the basic functionalities of Alteryx with some basic timings; checks that Python is working correctly; checks the memory allocation and temporary disk space - and then either persists this to disk and/or sends to a central environment for analysis?

Given a large deployed environment like ours (over 10 000 seats deployed) - self-checkout-telemetry like this would provide the central team with massive increase in their ability to manage the deployed base; and at the same time signficantly reduce the time to resolve support issues.

Hello,

As of today, the in db connexion window is divided into :
-write tab

-read tab

However, writing means two different thing : inserting and in-db writing. Alteryx has already 2 different tools (Data Stream In and Write Data).

Si what I propose is to divide the window into :
-read
-write
-insert

Best regards,

Simon

I use the field name auto-complete feature whenever I can. One issue with it, however, is when there are parentheses in a field name. After auto-completing the field name, Alteryx highlights a portion of the field name after the first parenthesis. This is not ideal as I typically expect the cursor to be at the end of the field name so I may continue to type. In this scenario, unfortunately, I would begin to type over my field name and the expression gets messed up. 

For example, as shown below, I begin to type "st" and then hit the tab button to complete the field name in my expression.

In this case, because my field name has parentheses in it, however, some of the field name remains highlighted and the cursor does not go to the end of the right bracket, as one would expect.

If I were to continue typing at this point, the highlighted portion of the expression would get erased and replaced. 

Field names that do not contain parentheses continue to function correctly as shown below. 

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

I understand the need for "exclusive rights" when using an input tool.  Unfortunately, due to the nature of some corporate data, getting write access to a file is not always possible.  I would like to have the ability to configure an input tool to open a file in "Read Only" mode while producing a warning message that the file was processed in that mode and may not contain the lastest version pf the data.  I envision this as a checkbox option in the tool configuration panel.

There needs to be a way to step into macro a which is component of parent workflow for debugging.

Currently the only way to achieve to debug these is to capture the inputs to the macro from the parent workflow, and then run the amend inputs on the macro. For iterative / batch macros, there is no option to debug at all. This can be tedious, especially if there are a number of inputs, large amounts of data, or you are have nested macros.

There should be an option on the tool representing the macro in the parent workflow to trigger a Debug when running the workflow, this would result in the same behavior when choosing 'Debug' from the interface panel in the macro itself: a new 'debug' workflow is created with the inputs received from the parent workflow.

On iterative / batch macros, which iteration / control parameter value the debug will be triggered on should be required. So if a macro returns an error on the 3 iteration, then the user ticks 'Debug' and Iteration = 3. If it doesn't reach the 3rd iteration, then no debug workflow is created.

We've had several requests from clients for the ability to import password protected Excel spreadsheets into Alteryx.  Within Alteryx, it would be good to specify the password and inport the file without the need to create an unprotected copy for use in Alteryx.

Thanks

The Download tool allows for encrypted SFTP connections, but I recently discovered (the hard way) that the Alteryx capabilities are incomplete and the algorithms not fully up to date. Just adding an additional updated algorithm or two to the 4 available for message authentication would bring it up to date.

As back story, our firm has onboarded a new SFTP server, and all of a sudden my Alteryx SFTP workflows didn't work when I pointed them at the new server. After going back and forth extensively with the helpful folks at Alteryx, we discovered there's a gap in Alteryx's current capabilities.

Basically, the Alteryx download tool can use the old encryption algorithm and half of the new version, and half of the new version is like having half a bridge.

Up until 2017, SHA-1 was the most common hash used for cryptographic signing. Since then it's been slowing getting supplanted by SHA-2.

Alteryx can use SHA-2 for key exchanges, but not for message authentication (the HMAC algorithm). The internet seems to swear up and down that the old SHA-1 algorithm works just fine for message authentication, but I don't have the luxury of caring about that. All I know is that as of March 2019 the SFTP server I have to connect with has deprecated Alteryx's SHA-1 algorithm as being too out of date and only allows the new SHA-2 message authentication. 

Alteryx CAN use the up to date SHA-2 for key exchange (GOOD, halfway there!) but can only use (old) ways of doing message authentication that do NOT include SHA-2 (NOT GOOD!). Please add updated SHA-2 algorithms (hmac-sha2-512, hmac-sha2-256) to the HMAC mix too!

Many thanks,

Josiah

In a controlled environment, there is a need to control promotion of assets to prod with basic controls to ensure that someone has tested, signed off, that it meets certain quality standards (like "no warnings", "no Run Commands", "all reports must have company logo on top left" etc).

However, at the moment there doesn't appear to be a promotion process in Alteryx to control this flow, so assets are copied across by an admin.   This is very manual and error prone (many times we've had the wrong assets copied), and it also means that this process is controlled in a workflow outside of Alteryx (e.g. A JIRA queue or similar).

Could we request that Alteryx look into a production promotion process, which allows the admin team to perform any required checks (including automated checks), and then pushes this into prod stamped with the designer's Kerberos rather than the sys admin?

Joint idea with @avinashbonu @DamianA  @BenBu

Currently the InDB tools require to select a DSN that is defined on your computer.

This makes any workflow which uses a DSN incredibly painful to deploy to the server, since the DSN needs to be created on every worker node and for a large server environment this can  mean creating DSN entries on 6+ worker nodes in prod plus prod server plus dev/UAT environment plus dev/UAT worker nodes.

Could we please change the InDB tools to default to DSN-less connections, where the connection persists the connection details in-line so that it can deploy to the server without a DSN setup (since all connection details are contained within the connection string)?

Thank you

Sean

CC: @rijuthav @jithinmony @HengHe @RajK @ydmuley @revathi @Deeksha @MPistone @Ari_Fuller @Arianna_Fuller @JoshKushner @samnelson @avinashbonu @Sunder_Sriram @Rahul_Thakur @Rahul_Singh

Alteryx hosting CRAN

Installing R packages in Alteryx has been a tricky issue with many posts over the years and it fundamentally boils down to the way the install.packages() function is used; I've made a detailed post on the subject. There is a way that Alteryx can help remedy the compatibility challenge between their updates of Predictive Tools and the ever-changing landscape that is open-source development. That way is for Alteryx to host their own CRAN!

The current version of Alteryx runs R 4.1.3, which is considered an 'old release', and there are over 18,000 packages on CRAN for this version of R. By the time you read this post, there is likely a newer version of one of these packages that the package author has submitted to the R Foundation's CRAN. There is also a good chance that package isn't compatible with any Alteryx tool that uses R. What if you need that package for a macro you've downloaded? How do you get the old version, the one that is compatible? This is where Alteryx hosting CRAN comes into full fruition.

Alteryx can host their own CRAN, one that is not updated by one of many package authors throughout its history, and the packages will remain unchanged and compatible with the version of Predictive Tools that is released. All we need to do as Alteryx users is direct install.packages() to the Alteryx CRAN to get our new packages, like so,

install.packages(pkg_name, repo = "https://cran.alteryx.com")

There is a R package to create a CRAN directory, so Alteryx can get R to do the legwork for them. Here is a way of using the miniCRAN package,

library(miniCRAN)
library(tools)
path2CRAN <- "/local/path/to/CRAN"
ver <- paste(R.version$major, strsplit(R.version$minor, "\\.")[[1]][1], sep = ".") # ver = 4.1
repo <- "https://cran.r-project.org" # R Foundation's CRAN
m <- available.packages() # a matrix of all packages and their meta data from repo
pkgs4CRAN <- m[,"Package"] # character vector of all packages from repo
makeRepo(pkgs = pkgs4CRAN, path = path2CRAN, type = c("win.binary", "source"), repos = repo) # makes the local repo
write_PACKAGES(paste(path2CRAN, "bin/windows/contrib", ver, sep = "/"), type = "win.binary") # creates the PACKAGES file for package binaries
write_PACKAGES(paste(path2CRAN, "src/contrib", sep = "/"), type = "source") # creates the PACKAGES files for package sources

It will create a directory structure that replicates R Foundation's CRAN, but just for the version that Alteryx uses, 4.1/. 

Alteryx can create the CRAN, host it to somewhere meaningful (like https://cran.alteryx.com), update Predictive Tools to use the packages downloaded with the script above and then release the new version of Predictive Tools and announce the CRAN. Users like me and you just need to tell the R Tool (for example) to install from the Alteryx repo rather than any others, which may have package dependency conflicts.

This is future-proof too. Let's say Alteryx decide to release a new version of Designer and Predictive Tools based on R 4.2.2. What do they do? Download R 4.2.2, run the above script, it'll create a new directory called 4.2/, update Predictive Tools to work with R 4.2.2 and the packages in their CRAN, host the 4.2/ directory to their CRAN and then release the new version of Designer and Predictive Tools.

Simple!

When using the unknown field in a select, you can either select or deselect the fields which will appear afterwards.

I would love to have an option or different to specify elements for fields to appear for instance having :

• *unknown text where you could set the metadata type (for instance vwstring) and maximal length
• *unknown numeric where you could set the type, double or fixed decimal

and for dates too

it would set a default behaviour for incoming text fields or numeric fields allowing for more precise deselction too.

A few suggestions that I think can improve the Sharepoint Files Output Tool:

1. Maybe I'm missing it, but I cannot see how you can delete a file from the output list once you've added it:
   1. 

       

      
      

       

2. Have the write headers output checkbox ticked by default as I expect this is the more common expectation:
   1. 

       

3. Take the file extension by default based on the users selection in the Options tab as I shouldn't have to write .xlsx for the extension:
   1. 

       

   2. 

       

@VojtechT 

Hello,

My issue is very easy to solve. I want to use the generic ODBC in memo for a specific base (monetdb here but it isn't important).

I try to ouput a flow in a MonetDB SQL database. As you can see, I only take very simple field types

However I get this error message :

Error: Output Data (3): Error creating table "exemplecomparetable.toto": [MonetDB][ODBC Driver 11.44.0][MONETDB_SAU]Type (datetime) unknown in: "create  table "exemplecomparetable"."toto" ("ID" int,"Libellé" char(50),"Date d"
syntax error in: ""Prix""
CREATE  TABLE "exemplecomparetable"."toto" ("ID" int,"Libellé" char(50),"Date de Maj" datetime,"Prix" float,"PMP" float)

Reminder : SQL is an ISO Norm. Default type should follow it, not the MS SQL configuration. Interoperability is key

Links to : for in-db
https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Ideas/Generic-In-database-connection-please-stop-i...

Issues constated : MonetDB
https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Output-Data-date-is-now-datetime-makin...

Informix: https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Alteryx-date-data-type-error-trying-to...


Best regards,

Simon

The expression editor in the RegEx tool is only a single line, which makes it really hard to edit long regular expressions. See attached photo comparing the expression editor in the RegEx tool compared to the formula tool for the same expression. Please make the RegEx editor box either wrap to multiple lines, have a pop-out expression editor, or something so we can see long expressions.

Would like to direclty query Hyperion Cube / Essbase data source directly - please propose functionality in next release or add a user macro to the gallery.  Thanks -cb

Currently if one wants to compare different alteryx files or different versions of the same file - one needs to compare the XML files. If you are not very familiar with navigating XML, this poses a risk as one may not be able to identify all changes.

It would be a great addition to Alteryx to integrate Alteryx with Git, Subversion, CVS, Mercurial, and GitHub as this tool is becoming the go-to tool for data processing for data analysts and even programmers.

This additional functionality to compare previous versions (diff) and also to merge alteryx workflows if two people are working on the same workflow, and also to easily see what changes have been committed/ made by other developers and when would make Alteryx a much more powerful tool and would open doors to other types of users, as essentially you can run anything through Alteryx.