Power Automate Integration

[ALT_2358]

Hi, 

I think it would be extremely useful to be able to trigger an Alteryx workflow using Power Automate. 

The main benefit I see at the moment is automatically triggering an Alteryx workflow when the input data has been refreshed.

This would also enable a Power App to be added directly to Power Bi which can simply be clicked to re-run an Alteryx workflow then refresh the Power Bi dataset. 

[KylieF]

Thank you for your feedback!

We appreciate all the feedback we get on how we can improve users automation and experience with scheduling workflows. It looks like you're relatively new to the idea boards (welcome!) so if you haven't yet be sure to check out our Submission Guidelines as they go over the process after an idea is submitted as well as we need from user engagement on an idea.

[cgoodman3]

When you want the integration with Power Automate is this to trigger a local workflow on designer or to trigger something on server? If it is on server then is there a way you could make a POST api call to pass the parameter and trigger the workflow (I'm not familiar with Automate so haven't explored this personally).

[ALT_2358]

I want to be able to trigger a workflow on the server. I'm not familiar with the API calls but it's interesting to know the capability might already be there.  

[cgoodman3]

If you check this link out it will show the documentation for the server.

To trigger a workflow via an API you need:

1) App ID and the question parameters you want to pass

2) The response from this to get the job ID and output ID

3) Then this can be used to retrieve the response.

This post by @patrick_digan is also really good for understanding the API calls and responses. It mean you can test triggering a Alteryx server workflow from Designer, and then it might be possible to replicate that in Power Automate, to kick off the workflow on server and then pull the response back to server. 

I'd be keen to hear how you get on with it.

[robwalks]

This would be incredibly useful and allow us to create cohesive business applications by integrating alteryx with power automate, powerapps and powerbi (and by extension therefore any dynamics application).

[chiraz_cheikha]

Hello, @ALT_2358 

can you please share with us if you tried the approach to transform an alteryx workflow that is already done in designer to an api that can be integrated to power automate ? 

[robwalks]

@chiraz_cheikha we have managed to get this working, but not without a huge amount of effort and workarounds. You need the server product; once the workflow is published to server then it can be called via API. However, our server is installed in Azure and is behind our corporate firewall so we had no-end of issues connecting to it.

In the end, we had to create an Azure function which is called by PowerAutomate to submit the workflow ID. We also had to create our own API (using Flask - a python tool) on the same server as Alteryx. Flask receives the PowerAutomate request and in-turn it then creates an API request to the Alteryx Server which triggers the workflow to run. We've only been able to get this working for basic workflows; for example, analytical apps which require parameters, would require different Azure function(s) and therefore we've decided are too much hassle.

[chiraz_cheikha]

@robwalks Okay i see, thank you so much for your detailed answer,

So is it mondatory to pass the workflow id via an api? 

i mean for a first test, do you think i can pass a workflow job url via power automate without using an azure function? 

[KidVallejo]

Hi Chiraz (I work for RobWalks and he asked me to follow up), 

From PowerAutomate (without creating custom connections) there mainly are two action options to send the HTTP request to the API end point:

1) HTTP 

2) HTTP with Azure AD

If your Alteryx server sits in a protected network (e.g. you must use a VPN to connect from off site) you will need to use option 2, which will require work in Azure Functions or similar to even test as you will need to send your request via a Gateway.

As the API call is a multi legged process:

1) HTTP GET request for Bearer Token sent to Alteryx server,

2) Bearer Token received,

3) HTTP  request as per API v2 guidance with Bearer Token and App ID sent to Alteryx server.

and much of the difficulty with protected networks we found is getting the response (Bearer Token) to Power Automate.

If you can confirm whether you need to go via a Gateway and I can see if I have any links that may help you, 

Chris

[chiraz_cheikha]

Hello @KidVallejo thank you so much for your reactivity,

in our case, we don't use vpn or a gateway, i just login to access to the company's gallery, but what's not clear for me is, how to execute an alteryx workflow via the api call, i mean i didn't find in the documentation something on how to run the workflow