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Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

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As an admin - we currently need to download a large number of different binaries for every release; then package them for internal deployment; then send them out.

This creates unnecessary work for our admin teams, our packaging teams, our deployment teams etc.

 

This problem is becoming more acute now that Alteryx is shipping add-on tools via the public gallery - so our standard desktop designer can now require 10 or more separately packaged installs.

 

Can we please change the download experience to allow enterprise admins to:

- Select the components that they want in a standard download

     - This would allow for a menu selection across all the starter kits (e.g. Tableau; microsoft; qlik); the standard designer; the predictive

     - it would also allow for a menu selection across public gallery assets so that we can include things like the model comparison tool and other new predictive capabilities

     - the addins for Microsoft R Server

     - database drivers

     - Connect data loaders

     - Server components

- Given this set a name (like "Standard designer install") since in a large enterprise we will have several different configurations (some for super-users; some for standard users).    In our world we'd have "Standard Designer"; "Admin"; "Connect Controller"; "SuperUser" as our starting list.

- Then download one installer which is the aggregated set of these in one place 

- ... and finally allow the Admin to be notified when any component in the install set changes so that they can download the new version.

 

 

cc: @dataMack @AshwiniChezhiyan @LizaNemchynova @revathi

Idea:

A tool for encryption/decription of a column with multiple encrypiton options is the idea.

Both one way and two way encription should be possible.

 

Rationale:

Clients are in need of encrypting customers' personal identification data

before sharing it with a third party like consultants and analytics service providers etc.

When insights are provided back the data owner needs to quickly decrypt the ID field and get results or decide actions.

 

Clients:

This is especially an important case for banks, non bank financial institutions and telecom companies in EU countries and similar (Turkey has similar strict rules)

 

Best

  • Feature Request

I usually don't mind the bell sound at the completion of workflow run.  But when wearing earphones the ding can be a bit jarring.

There is a "fix" as evidenced here: https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Discussions/Remove-Workflow-Completion-Sound/td-p/...

Another option is to use the Sound Mixer to mute system sounds

 

However, we could enjoy more granular control if we could mute the sound within Designer.  An option to choose our own Alteryx-specific sound would be gravy.

 

 

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

David

 

 

  • Feature Request

I was just thinking how nice it would be to have an IfError function like there is in Excel.  With Alteryx's design, there isn't really much need for the function.  I just ran into a case today where I thought it might be useful.  There was a function created after a crosstab that expected certain field names to exist.  I got around this by using filter, summarize, and join tools instead. 

 

It just stuck with me that it would be much easier to just say:

 

IfError([FieldThatDoesNotExist],0)

Something like this could also be used when referencing a field which has a calculation that produces an error.

 

I don't know if something like this would be completely antithetical to Alteryx's design, but there are times when it would definitely be convenient. 

  • Feature Request

I would like to request the ability to connect to a SharePoint List to bring data from and write data to via Windows Authentication.  Currently, the only way to connect to a SharePoint List is via username/password which does not work for our current environment.  

  • Feature Request

Idea:

I know cache-related ideas have already been posted (cache macros; cache tools), but I would like it if cache were simply built into every tool, similar to the way it is on the Input Tool.

 

Reasoning:

During workflow development, I'll run the workflow repeatedly, and especially if there is sizeable data or an R tool involved, it can get really time consuming.

 

Implementation ideas:

I can see where managing cache could be tricky: in a large workflow processing a lot of data, nobody would want to maintain dozens of copies of that data.  But there may be ways of just monitoring changes to the workflow in order to know if something needs to be rebuilt or not: e.g. suppose I cache a Predictive Tool, and then make no changes to any tool preceeding it in the workflow... the next time I run, the engine should be able to look at "cache flags" and/or "modified tool flags" to determine where it should start: basically start at the "furthest along cache" that has no "modified tools" preceeding it.

 

 

Anyway, just a thought.

 

After hitting "Test" in Workflow Dependencies:


Failed result = Bold red text (and a message)

Success result = Nothing? 

 

Maybe we could get bold green letting us know that the test completed successfully. 

In every application, be it in Designer or on the Server product, please make version number easily available in Help --> About and make it copy-able so that we can quickly copy-paste it when submitting a case.

 

Currently, the Server product does not even have a menu item to quickly be able to see what exact version number it is on.

  • Feature Request

It would be nice if you could add blank space or separators between elements in the visual layout tool. 
I want some additional spacing between data tables/charts. 

 

Currently, my work around is adding a blank report text box. It is not the most streamlined solution, but works. 

  • Feature Request

I would like to have all my annotations show on top of the tools by default. I can change them one at a time, but I would like to be able to change the default setting to be "Show Annotations on the Top" always.

Hello Product Management,

 

I'm trying to emulate a graph from the book, Effective Data Visualization by Dr. Stephanie Evergreen.  Here's what I have so far:

 

capture.png

This was a little bit of work to create and while it isn't what I exactly had hoped for, it does approximate my attempt.  Ideally, I would do the following to complete the exercise:

  1. Have a Y-Axis (none) line on for both Old/New Sites (dual-axis)
  2. Replace the Y-Axis number with the Label for the departments
  3. Remove the (line) from the label

As observations, in order to add carriage returns to NOTES, i had to use HTML tags <br>.  The settings for points and lines required me to do lots of configuration.  Maybe a format painter would help to copy the format from one set of point/lines to the next.  Once I completed a chart/insight it would be "nice" to be able to copy and configure the other.  If you have an insight and wish to create a chart, you have to reconfigure the new element from scratch.

 

I do have an error in the creation of the chart that says, "Error parsing configuration."  I have no idea what error exists.  I submitted a ticket on that issue.  

 

I haven't created this chart via Excel, but the textbook shows you how to create the result in Excel.  The graph is easy for me to see and to understand.  I like it and think that it could be a valuable way to demonstrate the potential for Alteryx visualizations.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark

Instead of adding a tool container to the canvas, then moving my input tool into that - it would be nice if I could just click a box for 'Disable' in the input tool properties.  This would speed up things if I'm trying to test inputs one at a time; or need to disable just one specific output while I test another data stream in my workflow.

It would be nice to have the ability to automatically generate twbx files from a master Tableau workbook so that end users can open the file in Tableau reader.  For example, if I were creating separate CSV files with my data for each state I would similarly want to create them as a ready to consume twbx file with Tableau Reader.

  • Feature Request

So lets say I have five incoming connection.  SQL, Redshift, Excel...whatever.  I know I can right click, or control-right click on each incoming connection and select cache and run workflow.  I'd imagine there would be a run and cache all incoming connections but there isn't.  I realize I can arrange all incoming connections so they arrange easily so I can box them all, but on complex workflows, this might get complicated.

I hope that there will be a radio button or a check box where Auto Save on Run can be disabled.  Auto Save on Run is a bad idea.  I often go into workflows and only need one report - so I break a bunch of connections to other reports, maybe I make some other small adhoc or one-off type changes and then Run the workflow.  I get my one, maybe modified, report and close without saving.  So the next time I open the workflow it's as it should be. 

 

With Auto Save on Run - I'd have to undo everything I changed.  What if it's not my workflow to be changing?  If there is no option to turn it off:  I'd have to make a copy of the workflow, open and make changes, then run, then close, then delete the workflow.

 

In general, you should never be saving unless it is a deliberate act performed by the user.

When opening an App in Designer - you are generally opening it to work on.  It should not open as an App but rather it should open as a Workflow.  Maybe make it so if you hold down the Ctrl or Shift key and opens the App - it opens as an App and you can test it out.

Working across a large organisation inevitably leads to people using different drive letters when mapping drives/folders. This makes sharing workflows and macros with other teams more difficult and the first thing I do when creating a new workflow is change the dependencies to All UNC.

 

This suggestion is to offer the option to default all workflows to UNC via the user settings. Acknowledging that some users will prefer listing files by drive letter and other UNC, adding the option could make life a little bit easier for everyone.

Exactly as the subject says: It would be incredibly useful to be able to change the colour, and possibly the line thickness of the connectors between tools.

We have workflows with huge amounts of stuff going on, as I'm sure many people do.

Being able to colour code the connections between tools would help us to trace things from place to place when stepping through the workflow.

the SQL Editing screen has recently been changed (thank you @JPoz  and team!) - and now has syntax indenting and keyword coloring.

 

Could I ask that you make a minor change in the indenting, where the on part is indented underneath the Join?

 

Select

    Field1,

    Field2,

    field3

from

    Table1

    inner join table2

        On Table1.key = table2.key

        and table1.keyb = table2.keyb

    inner join table3

        on table3.key = table1.key

        and table3.date = table1.date

 

 

 

 

 

The Input Data tool has a "Field Length" option for CSV files. The default is 254 characters. In most cases, this is woefully inadequate. I tend to add several zeroes to the end to prevent truncation. When I don't remember to do this, I get flooded with conversion errors:

"Input Data (2) The field "hours" was truncated in record #38"

 

I want to set a global default, that I can override per tool, for length so I don't have to do this every time.

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