ServerRipper - Using the Alteryx Gallery API to download workflows en masse

As server admins, we sometimes get in a bind where we have just done a rollback on the server or a cutover and then a user comes out of the woodwork to request a workflow that got lost in the shuffle. We then face restoring the old backup to a lower environment to grab the workflow. This happened to my team recently and it made me want to take a more frequent backup of all of the workflows (we already back up our MongoDB daily), just in case. That is why this utility ServerRipper was created.

This utility builds on the excellent work of @patrick_digan about the Alteryx API and @jdunkerley79 on dynamic directory creation using the Run Command tool.

End Result

After running the workflow, a hierarchy of folders is created. Within the top-level folder - I have called mine ServerWorkflowBackup - a folder is created for each Studio/Subscription e.g. Finance, Accounting, Admins.

Within each Subscription folder, a folder is created for each User.

Finally, within each user folder is a .yxzp package of every workflow and app that the user owns on the gallery.

Install and Run

Download and open the file ServerRipper_community.yxzp attached. This was developed in Designer 2020.1.

When prompted to import packages, say yes. Ignore errors and warnings on the Import Workflow Package and Workflow Dependencies popups.

Close Designer and go back to your download location. At this location '\ServerRipper_community\yxi installer' find and install 'Alteryx API Runner.yxi'. Reopen the workflow.

Follow the rest of the instructions in the workflow.

If you find that you have errors, ensure that the Cleanse tool is set up correctly, and ensure that you are a Curator in your Gallery.

I hope that you find this simple to use and that it saves you from a headache someday. Enjoy!

ServerRipper_community.yxzp

Workflow

Gallery

Tips and Tricks

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API

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Accepted answers

All comments

hroderick-thr

I'm definitely going to use this.

Beyond backups I want to search the xml find connections, sql, etc.

Thanks SO much for sharing

mtornga

@hroderick-thr wrote:
Beyond backups I want to search the xml find connections, sql, etc.

Same! Let me know what you discover.

adrianp112

@mtornga

Thank you so much for you work flow , we have it working in our environment now 🙂

One thing though, in the formula tool before the batch file creation , just added a couple quotes to encase the folder path..... we have some exotic active directory names with more than one period eg: value1.value2.lastname

thanks again!

shareef2

Hi, Thanks for the solution. When i ran the job i see all YXZP files created. May i know how can i download (yxmd/yxmc/yxwz files). Because i want to open all workflows as text(XML) in designer and search for TEXT. (to see how may workflows using one table)

With YXZP i would need to extract each package one by one to read (yxmd/yxmc/yxwz files). Please help.

Thanks.

adrianp112

Hi Shareef

As far as I can see in the API docs you can only download assets as a package .yxzp .... you will need another component to unpack and search for your text in the underlying XML.

Cheers

Adrian

lcrosby

If anyone is still looking at this - workflow packages (yxzp files) are actually just zip files, so if you output them from the api with a file extension of zip, then you can open them like a normal archive file with an input tool and then grab the actual workflow file within.

hroderick-thr

It has served me well. I built an app that people run to get a workflow into production. The ripper downloads it from a collection, does an xml inspection and xml changes. Returns an email to requestor with inspection report and a code they provide to a second app if they want to proceed to production. It does a lot of stuff specific to our operations, but being able to manage the transition from dev to prod will be common to most of us.

Thableaus

Cool!

lcrosby

Yeah I've just implemented a workflow that grabs all the workflows/apps on our gallery, downloads them to the temp folder as packages and then opens the package file to pull the XML from the workflow file. We can then audit what tools/macros are being implemented and where so if we make a change to a macro we can easily identify where it's used to check if an update causes any trouble. Saves a lot of time, hopefully.

BENOIT_RAFFIN

Hi Alteryx Community,

ServerRipper_Community Workflow does not work anymore with our new Alteryx Server (version 2021.3.2.54175).

List of all workflows through API works (first part of the workflow) but the second part (download data and save yxzp) does not work anymore.

No data.

Any help would be appreciated. Best regards,

chvizda

Really cool. I can now sleep much better.

pringleb

Stupid question... what should the endpoint URL be? Is it just the https://alteryx.domain.com or https://alteryx.domain.com/gallery or something else? I keep getting 404 errors with either of those (with the correct domain).

Yes, my gallery is still on 2020.1.

hroderick-thr

something like this

http://mygalleryserver01/gallery/api/admin/v1/collections/

hroderick-thr

Better late than never

We use command line 7zip to make it easier to read long full paths are in red, command code is bold black, comments are blue

rem delete unzip destination directory if it already exists

IF EXIST "\\myserver\d\THR\AlteryxApps\AlteryxJobPromotion\Lockers\20220805095211 mynetworkid\Pharmacy Antimicrobial Dashboard Alteryx Process" RMDIR /S /Q "\\myserver\d\THR\AlteryxApps\AlteryxJobPromotion\Lockers\20220805095211 mynetworkid\Pharmacy Antimicrobial Dashboard Alteryx Process"

rem unpack yxzp which come with yxmd file type
"\\myserver\d\Program Files\7-Zip\7z.exe" x "\\myserver\d\THR\AlteryxApps\AlteryxJobPromotion\Lockers\20220805095211 mynetworkid\Pharmacy Antimicrobial Dashboard Alteryx Process.yxmd" -o"\\myserver\d\THR\AlteryxApps\AlteryxJobPromotion\Lockers\20220805095211 mynetworkid\Pharmacy Antimicrobial Dashboard Alteryx Process" -Y -aoa

rem always return code zero
TIMEOUT /T 0

pringleb

Thank you for the quick reply. I tried that and get an "Unauthorized" if I try with "http" and get a "307 Temporary Redirect" if I try with "https" . Our company enforces SSL on the servers. Does this not work with SSL?

jaxx084

This tool is awesome. Thank you! But... I'm trying to download specific versions of the workflows. To do this, I need to add ?version=xxxx to the endpoint URL. I have this working in Postman, but I can't get Alteryx to run it successfully. Once I add this to the URL, I get an unauthorized error. Any ideas? Please

hroderick-thr

Does anyone know if this works after old API version stops working ?

londonhanson

@hroderick-thr There is an updated workflow based on this that downloads all workflows, and can search the XML within them. There is both an OAuth1 and OAuth2 workflow (newer APIs use OAuth2):
https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Server-Knowledge-Base/Search-Gallery-Workflows-for-Connections-Files-Queries-Tools-and/ta-p/1098230

I hope this helps!

hroderick-thr

I wish I could Niat, but there is too much company specific information about the dev and prod environments to share and a mock up would not work.

The app is working in 21.4 which we are on

The app does not work in our next version 22.3

I had to rewrite it to use the new apis and one function, to download a workflow, is not supported in that version.

The missing function is available in 23.1 so we will skip 22.3

The app I wrote has 2 phases and uses chained apps

Phase 1

extracts a list of all workflows shared with a staging collection and allows developer to select one from a list
downloads and parses the selected workflow, while parsing a list of standard violations is collected and changes for production is made to the xml
after parsing and email is sent to developer with list of standard violations and the modified workflow is saved in a secure subdirectory we call lockers. The locker is named with the timestamp and developer network id.

Phase 2

The developer next requests a promotion using ServiceNow and attaches the generated email
If acceptable, an admin runs a second app and provides the locker number to install the modified workflow

niat_alteryx

I can understand that as per company security standards, you cannot share the Prod and DEV credentials.

As mentioned, I am new to workflow development and it's hard for me to create macro or perform API call for now.And to create chained apps will take month for me.

I would appreciate if you blank or strike your company information and send me the mock app so that I can understand the flow and make use of app.

Additionaly,Our Alteryx Prod Gallery is running with 2021.4 and users asking for when to get new version.

Could you please support me on how to decide which alteryx server version is stable and can be upgraded to Prod.?

Basically what are the factors we need to see before doing upgrade.

Are you planning to go for 2023.1 version?

hroderick-thr

I'm sorry, but I the assistance you seek would lead to more questions. If you are in a hurry, recommend you engage professional services that have experience in Alteryx chained apps and apis for an estimated two to four weeks. Even better would be to continue your learning journey and experience the thrill of solving yourself. All the methods I needed to build this was pieced together from these forums and people in the community were helpful where I struggled, but no one has the full solution you will need.

23.1 is up and stable. There are some local details that make it a challenge for my company because we are using Alteryx in some uncommon ways that may not apply to your situation.

niat_alteryx

Hello Team,

On running ripper workflow,it fails because fail to find execMe.Bat file.

Where this batch file is stored.?

niat_alteryx

My workflows fail due to missing execMe.bat responsible for creating directories.

Someone help me where to find this batch file.

HaroldR1612

Hello Team,

Just try to run the workflow but it throws the following error when running it:

error ripper.png

The Formula tool is the one that is failing, I've looked at the previous tools but didn't catch where this ID variable is created. Could you please advise?

Thanks,

yuriy

@mtornga, @hroderick-thr if you have not found this yet, please see https://knowledge.alteryx.com/index/s/article/Search-Gallery-Workflows-for-Connections-Files-Queries-Tools-and-More

RK7

Hi
Did you get the answer to this. I'm stuck at the same place

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