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Alteryx Designer Desktop Ideas

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I think it would be great to have a tool that allows you to update a dataset with another dataset. For example, this could be used in updating an archive table on a daily basis as data changes. Having a tool available that streamlines this data operation would be helpful to simplify workflows.

 

In the tool, you would be given the option to select your primary key fields, which are the fields used to identify records. Additionally, you have the option to perform an insert, modify, or delete operation, according to the primary key fields that you choose in the configuration.

 

Obviously this is something that anybody could create a macro for if they wanted to. But it would be nice to have a tool in place so that we dont have to worry about it. I think this would be a nice use case to bolster Alteryx usage as a data engineering tool for relational database management in particular.

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When a workflow runs on the server and the server tells me there was an error with Tool ID 103, I'd like to be able to open that workflow in my designer and search for that Tool ID 103.  We have some really large workflows and it takes a long time to manually locate that tool.

It would be great if you could include a new Parse tool to process Data Sets description (Meta data) formatted using the DCAT (W3C) standard in the next version of Alteryx.

DCAT is a standard for the description of data sets. It provides a comprehensive set of metadata that can be used to describe the content, structure, and lineage of a data set.

We believe that supporting DCAT in Alteryx would be a valuable addition to the product. It would allow us to:

  • Improve the interoperability of our data sets with other systems (M2M)
  • Make it easier to share and reuse our data sets
  • Provide a more consistent way to describe our data sets
  • Bring down the costs of describing and developing interfaces with other Government Entities
  • Work on some parts of making our data Findable – Accessible – Interopable - Reusable (FAIR)

We understand that implementing support for this standards requires some development effort (eventually done in stages, building from a minimal viable support to a full-blown support). However, we believe that the benefits to the Alteryx Community worldwide and Alteryx as a top-quality data preparation tool outweigh the cost.

 

I also expect the effort to be manageable (perhaps a macro will do as a start) when you see the standard RDF syntax being used, which is similar to JSON.

 

DCAT, which stands for Data Catalog Vocabulary, is a W3C Recommendation for describing data catalogs in RDF. It provides a set of classes and properties for describing datasets, their distributions, and their relationships to other datasets and data catalogs. This allows data catalogs to be discovered and searched more easily, and it also makes it possible to integrate data catalogs with other Semantic Web applications. 

DCAT is designed to be flexible and extensible, so they can be used to describe a wide variety. They are both also designed to be interoperable, so they can be used together to create rich and interconnected descriptions of data and knowledge.

 

Here are some of the benefits of using DCAT:

  • Improved discoverability: DCAT makes it easier to discover and use KOS, as they provide a standard way of describing their attributes.
  • Increased interoperability: DCAT allows KOS to be integrated with other Semantic Web applications, making it possible to create more powerful and interoperable applications.
  • Enhanced semantic richness: DCAT provides a way to add semantic richness to KOS , making it possible to describe them in a more detailed and nuanced way.

Here are some examples of how DCAT is being used:

  • The DataCite metadata standard uses DCAT to describe data catalogs.
  • The European Data Portal uses DCAT to discover and search for data sets.
  • The Dutch Government made it a mandatory standard for all Dutch Government Agencies.

As the Semantic Web continues to grow, DCAT is likely to become even more widely used.

 

DCAT

 

RDF

 

 

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It would be great if you could include a new Parse tool to process Business Glossary concepts formatted using the SKOS (W3C) standard in the next version of Alteryx.

SKOS is a widely used standard for the representation of concept and term relationships. It provides a consistent way to define and organize concepts (including versioning), which is essential for the interoperability of these data.

We believe that supporting SKOS in Alteryx would be a valuable addition to the product. It would allow us to:

  • Improve the interoperability of our data sets with other systems (M2M)
  • Make it easier to share and reuse our data sets
  • Provide a more consistent way to describe our data sets
  • Bring down the costs of describing and developing interfaces with other Government Entities
  • Work on some parts of making our data Findable – Accessible – Interopable - Reusable (FAIR)

We understand that implementing support for this standards requires some development effort (eventually done in stages, building from a minimal viable support to a full-blown support). However, we believe that the benefits to the Alteryx Community worldwide and Alteryx as a top-quality data preparation tool outweigh the cost.

 

I also expect the effort to be manageable (perhaps a macro will do as a start) when you see the standard RDF syntax being used, which is similar to JSON.

 

SKOS, which stands for Simple Knowledge Organization System, is a W3C Recommendation for representing controlled vocabularies in RDF. It provides a set of classes and properties for describing concepts, their relationships, and their labels. This allows KOS to be shared and exchanged more easily, and it also makes it possible to use KOS data in Semantic Web applications.

 

SKOS is designed to be flexible and extensible, so they can be used to describe a wide variety. They are both also designed to be interoperable, so they can be used together to create rich and interconnected descriptions of data and knowledge.

 

Here are some of the benefits of using SKOS:

  • Improved discoverability: SKOS makes it easier to discover and use KOS, as they provide a standard way of describing their attributes.
  • Increased interoperability: SKOS allows KOS to be integrated with other Semantic Web applications, making it possible to create more powerful and interoperable applications.
  • Enhanced semantic richness: SKOS provides a way to add semantic richness to KOS , making it possible to describe them in a more detailed and nuanced way.

Here are some examples of how SKOS and DCAT are being used:

  • The Library of Congress uses SKOS to describe its controlled vocabularies.
  • The Dutch Government made it a mandatory standard for all Dutch Government Agencies.

As the Semantic Web continues to grow, SKOS is likely to become even more widely used.

 

SKOS

 

RDF

 

Sometimes, Control Containers produce error messages even if they are deactivated by feeding an empty table into their input connection.

 

screenshot_error_in_spite_control_container_deactivated.png

(Note that this is a made up example of something which can happen if input tables might be from different sources and have different columns so that they need separated treatment.)

 

According to the product team, this is expected behaviour since a selection does not allow zero columns selected. This might be true (which I doubt a bit), but it is at least counter-intuitive. If this behaviour cannot be avoided in total, I have a proposal which would improve the user experience without changing the entire workflow validation logic.

(The support engineer understands the point and has raised a defect.)

 

Instead of writing messages inside Control Containers directly to the log output (on screen, in logfile) and to mark the workflow as erroneous, I propose to introduce a message (message, warning, error) stack for tools inside Control Containers:

  1. When the configuration validation is executed:
    1. Messages (messages, warnings, errors) produced outside of Control Containers are output to the screen log and to the log files (as today).
    2. Messages (messages, warning, errors) produced inside of Control Containers are not yet output but stored in a message stack.
  2. At the moment when it is decided whether a Control container is activated or deactivated:
    1. If Control Container activated: Write the previously stored message stack for this Control Container to the screen and to the log output, and increase error and warning counts accordingly.
    2. If Control Container deactivated: Delete the message stack for this Control Container (w/o reporting anything to the log and w/o increasing error and warning count).

This would result in a different sequence of messages than today (because everything inside activated Control Containers would be reported later than today). Since there’s no logical order of messages anyways, this would not matter. And it would avoid the apparently illogical case that deactivated Control Containers produce errors.

We currently have language support for a few major languages. I know Chinese is available, but the writing system is only Simplified at this moment. 

I was recently in conversation with a few people from Taiwan, and they are using the Traditional writing system of Chinese. 

If Alteryx can provide Traditional as an additional to their already available Simplified writing system, I think Alteryx can help capture the market in Taiwan better. 

The people I spoke with never heard of Alteryx before, and after a demo - they were impressed. If it has this language support, then I think it’ll be much easier to get more sign ups for Alteryx from the Taiwanese market. 

Currently when debug mode is entered in analytic apps and macros, the direct inputs to the app/macro when the error occurred are hardcoded into a workflow in debug mode, so that errors can be more easily detected.

 

However, inputs into analytic apps also create global variables which can be used in the more code-heavy aspects of Alteryx such as the Formula Tool. These are not updated in the same way which can cause workflows to break in debug mode - it would be really helpful if global variables could be updated in the same way as the inputs into tools are.

There should be a quick way to delete all unwanted tools for specific output/browse tool in workflow. This would be useful when we have huge multiple cross connect workflow. By deleting all not requited tools, it would make it easy and faster to test as segregated.

Everyone knows the importance of adding the appropriate controls and governance to your workflows - and often, this means including events that will generate notifications if a workflow is running with errors.

 

But who is the audience of that email? If it's not a developer, will that person know what they are reading and where to focus?

 

How about a developer that would like to customize the message that the end user will receive?

 

Porting some existing functionality from other tools in the Alteryx toolkit to the Events page could easily provide added flexibility to event generation:

 

1) Add a formatting bar to the tool like shown in the image below

-- Style changes

-- Alignment

-- Highlighting

-- Coloring

-- Images

 

2) Add a function bar to the tool like shown in the image below

-- Ability to view all available variables

-- Ability to apply formulas using variables

-- Ability to save formulas

 

Events.JPG

 

What do you think? Give this post a thumbs up if you find the post helpful!

It would be great if we could add example workflows to our macros, accessible in the same way as from the original tools (example hyperlink shown after single-clicking on a tool in the tool palette or when searching in the search bar).

 

There is a post on how to do it for custom tools How to add an example link in the custom tool (alteryx.com). The way described there has limitations and does not seem to work on macros: I was able to get the link to show up, but nothing happens when I click.

 

My suggestion, make it easy to add an example workflow to a macro, like it is to change the logo or add a help link.

example workflow.png

Hello all,


As of today, we use the good old alias in-memory to connect to our datasources in in-memory. We have several environments so we use constants in order to change the name of the in-memory alias during execution.

To illustrate :

simonaubert_bd_0-1701895804110.png

 

 

Depending of the environment, the constant « v_gp_contexte » will take different values :

  • GP_DS08_SIDATA for la dev.
  • GP_EE_SIDATA for prod.

Sounds nice, right? But now, we would like to use DCM and the nightmare begins :

We can't manually change the name and set the question :

simonaubert_bd_2-1701895988262.png

 

if we look at the xml of the workflow, we only find an id so editing it is useless :

simonaubert_bd_3-1701895988262.png

 


(for informationDCM connections are stored in some sqlite db in C:\Users\{yourname}\AppData\Local\Alteryx

So, I would like to use the DCM inside the in-memory alias (the in-memory alias is stored and can be edited), just like for in-db connection alias.

Best regards,

Simon

 

 

The ability to output to Amazon Workdocs via a special Output tool would be very helpful for anyone looking into using Workdocs for personal or professional purposes.  This is similar in functionality to the OneDrive connector.

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This is a question which is somehow in between Designer and Gallery ideas.

When saving a workflow to the Gallery, the user can select the Assets (elements which are also copied to the Gallery). The point in time during the save process is a bit questionable from my perspective.

 

Often, I develop workflows locally until they reach a state in which I want to move them to the Gallery so that they can be included in Schedules or be made available to other users. I would like to be able to select which macros or datafiles are copied to the Gallery as well much earlier in the development process. From my perspective, it would be great if the user could set the Assets settings in the "Workflow Dependencies" window as well. I propose 3 possible values for each element (macro or data file):

  • "Auto" → decide on asset when saving the workflow to the Gallery (current behaviour)
  • "Yes" → Copy this element as asset in the Gallery
  • "No" → Do not copy this element to the Gallery 
  • "N/A" → The question does not apply to this row (e.g., directory)

It could look like this:

workflow_dependencies-01.png

So our company is relatively new to Alteryx Designer and Server and we recently found out that there's no official communication sent out from Alteryx on when there are patch releases for Designer and Server. We've encountered so many bugs that we later found on the release notes that would've been helpful to know about months before.

 

So my suggestion is to have an option for Administrators to opt in/out for communication emails on when the patches are released.

 

Thank you!

Hi - Please delete this if it perhaps exists already in a newer version.  (I am on 2022.1 and don't see this functionality.) 

 

I would love to see the ability to right click a tool that isn't in a container and be able to add it to an existing container.  Currently I drag it over and drop it into the container then move it back to where it was.  Inevitably I misalign the tools and spend time getting it linear again. It would be cool if based upon the choice made in the right click, it would bring the assigned container around the tool in its existing location.

 

OR

 

Perhaps within the config of the container you could choose tool #s to add to the container?

 

Anyways this isn't a huge need but it would be nice to see that additional functionality for people that spend a disproportionate amount of time aligning and distributing their tools HORIZONTALLY.  (Nobody cares about the people that do vertical workflows.)

 

 

container idea.png

 

 

 

 

Our company has a need to link a new data source in Athena.  We have been able to establish a connection using the input functionality however the connection is so slow it is unusable.  We need to have Alteryx build an In Database option for Athena to allow us to link our data lake to Alteryx.  

Hey all,

 

At present, if you have an existing canvas and you want to move to a DCM Connection - you are asked something like "this will reset all of your connection details - are you sure".    If you have complex queries; or pre+post SQL - then you first have to copy all of this out into Notepad before you can convert to DCM and then reconfigure it all again.

 

However, if you are not using DCM you can change data sources when you go into Workflow Dependancies without losing your queries etc.

 

 

Capture.PNG

 

 

Could we revisit the user experience of changing to or from a DCM connection to eliminate this "start from scratch" phenomenon - if you are converging from an existing SQL ODBC or ODB or SSVB connection to a SQL connection via DCM then it should allow you to make this conversion without losing your current configuration; and the same for any other database type.

 

cc: @mbarone 

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

 

We all know and love the Comment tool. It's a staple of every workflow to give users an idea of the workflow in finer details. It's a powerful tool - it helps adds context to tools and containers, and it also serves as an image placeholder for us to style our workflows as aesthetically pleasing as possible.

 

Now, the gensis of this idea is inspired by this post and subsequent research question here.

 

The Comment Tool today allows you to:

  • Write your text and provide context / documentation to your workflow
  • Style its shape
  • Style its font, colour, and background colour
  • Align the text
  • Put an image to your workflow

image.png

 

But it would provide way more functionality if it had the capabilities of another awesome Alteryx tool that is not so frequently mentioned... the Report Text Tool!

 

What's missing in the Comment tool that the Report Text tool has?

  1. The ability to add active data records from the workflow to its text
  2. Its wider range of styles which allows for more functionality such as with its Special Tags functions
  3. Its ability to hyperlink
  4. Text mode options!

image.png

 

Now, whilst I understand that the Report Text tool is just that, a tool that needs to be connected to the data to work, so too does the Comment tool (to a lesser extent).

 

It would be awesome to have the ability to connect the data to the Comment tool as it was a Control Container-like connector. It can also be just like the Report Text tool with an optional input, thereby making it like a normal Comment tool.

 

To visualize my point:

image.png

 

The benefits of doing so:

  • Greater flexibility to the user
  • Styles are endgame
  • Users can use the comment box as a checksum or even a total count / checker to ensure everything is working as intended
  • Makes the comment tool more powerful as a dynamic workflow documentation tool

I think it'll be a killer feature enhancement to the comment tool. Hoping to hear comments on this! 

 

Kindly like, share, and subscribe I mean comment your support. Thanks all! 😁

 

-caltang

Hi all,

 

At present, Alteryx does not support DSN-free connections to Snowflake using the Bulk Connector.    This is a critical functionality for any large company that uses Alteryx - and so I'm hoping that this can be changed in the product in an upcoming release.    As a corollary - every DB connection type has to be able to work without DSNs for any medium or large size server instance - so it's worth extending this to check every DB connection type available in Alteryx.

 

Here are the details:

 

What is DSN-Free?

In order to be able to run our Alteryx canvasses on a multi-node server - we have to avoid using DSNs - so we generally expand connection strings that look like this:

odbc:DSN=DSNSnowFlakeTest;UID=Username;PWD=__EncPwd1__|||NEWTESTDB.PUBLIC.MYTESTTABLE

 

to instead have the fully described connection string like this:
odbc:DRIVER={SnowflakeDSIIDriver};UID=Username;pwd=__EncPwd1__;authenticator=Snowflake;WAREHOUSE=compute_wh;SERVER=xnb27844.us-east-1.snowflakecomputing.com;SCHEMA=PUBLIC;DATABASE=NewTestDB;Staging=local;Method=user

 

For Snowflake BL:

Now - for the Snowflake Bulk Loader the same process does not work and Alteryx gives the classic error below

 

With DSN:

snowbl:DSN=DSNSnowFlakeTest;UID=Username;pwd=__EncPwd1__;Staging=local;Method=user|||NEWTESTDB.PUBLIC.MYTESTTABLE

 

Without DSN:

snowbl:driver=SnowflakeDSIIDriver;UID=SeanBAdamsJPMC;pwd=__EncPwd1__;SERVER=xnb27844.us-east-1.snowflakecomputing.com;WAREHOUSE=compute_wh;SCHEMA=PUBLIC;DATABASE=NewTestDB;Staging=local;Method=user|||NEWTESTDB.PUBLIC.MYTESTTABLE

 

Output Data (6) Error SQLDriverConnect: [Microsoft][ODBC Driver Manager] Data source name not found and no default driver specified" which indicates that the driver details may be wrong

 

 

Many thanks

Sean

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