What tool is best for...?

[lkerr]

Hi! 

I am fairly new to Alteryx, and I am still getting up to speed on the system interface. I am inquiring what the best way to blend data in my specific case is...and I would love your thoughts! 

I have a set of data that encompasses a part number and a whole lot of additional information in regards to that part number [this specific data set is my base input foundation that I will be adding information to]. I have another set of data that incorporates work orders [discrete jobs]. There are multiple work orders [multiple entries] that correlate to one part number. 

I want to populate a column for each work order that correlates to the part number. Right now, I am only using the Find and Replace tool -- which is much like VLOOKUP in excel that only provides the first instance found in the data set. Is there a tool I am missing out on that is just like the Find and Replace tool that continues its search loop against the part number until the data set is complete, adding in columns for each TRUE case it finds against the search criteria? 

Thanks! 

[MarqueeCrew]

If you use a JOIN tool, it will get you all matches for the part# in the JOIN output anchor.  From that data, you can FILTER the results down to the most appropriate record that you want to keep or you can configure logic to composite the data.

Cheers,

Mark

[lkerr]

Thank you! 

I am looking into this now -- but am stuck on the fact that I want to retain the structure of my foundation input (as it is in a bill of material format with levels). But, it seems I need to use the "join by specified fields" option rather than the "join by record position option", which jumbles the order of the input.

Is there any way to get around this - to join by PN but still keep the position of the input field?

Thanks!

Lauren  

[ThizViz · Accepted solution]

Could you add a record ID field before the join and then sort the data by record ID after the join?

[lkerr]

Ah, thank you! I needed that push to think outside of the box.

This worked!