Publish Data Sources to Tableau with Alteryx 10.1

[JCR]

Alteryx 10.1 introduces a new tool for publishing data sources to Tableau Server and Tableau Online. This new capability streamlines a number of use cases when it comes to enabling more Tableau users with clean and rich data sets prepared with Alteryx. Benefits include instant refreshes to the underlying data that fuels Tableau workbooks,  the ability to edit workflows and push live on the backend, and easy automation of data refreshes.

The tool, typically placed at the end of the Alteryx workflow uploads the resulting data set to Tableau Server / Tableau Online and publishes a Data Source in the Project, and with the Name specified by the user as shown in the screenshot below:

To access this new feature, make sure to use Alteryx version 10.1 or above. Once Alteryx is installed, you will need to download and install the new Publish To Tableau Server tool from the Alteryx Gallery, search for the tool and download it.

The tool comes with a packaged installer that needs to be extracted in Alteryx Designer. The best is to double-click on the downloaded file Publish to Tableau Server [Installer].yxzp This launches Alteryx and the Import wizard. Unpack the workflow, accept to load it when prompted, then follow the installation instructions provided in the workflow.

Import wizard:

Installation Instructions

Once the tool is installed, restart Alteryx. You'll find it in the Tableau category in the Alteryx tools palette.

Instructions for using this tool are available in the Alteryx Online Help. For a quick start you may want to watch this short introduction video.

Thanks for your interest in using Alteryx and Tableau, please don't hesitate to share your feedback, comments or ideas in the Alteryx Community.

[cbridges]

@JCR I downloaded the macro and I'm using 10.1, but my dialog box is not the same as yours. But I had previously installed the "unofficial" Tableau tools, which also had a tool to publish data, so I'm thinking it's still using the "old" tool. Do I need to uninstall something before I install the new tool in order for it to work properly?

[cbridges]

Nevermind, I never ran the app - duh!

[Kumar]

I am using Alteryx designer 10.1 and Tableau server 9.2.0 . Now two questions :

1. When I use the "Publish to Tableau server Installer" I get issues while running the app. It gives me Bad Request - Payload is either matformed XML or incomplete. Any suggestions ?

2 . Can we really publish this app / workflow to Alteryx server ?

Thanks.

[puttarajud]

Hi Team,

This is wonderful feaute. This feature makes my life easy.

When I run the workflow, tde file appears in datasources of project Tab. However, I need to overwrite tde files in datasources of workbooks(Views).

Kindly suggest a solution.

Thanks

Puttaraju D M

[wgreig]

Thanks, this was a really helpful video.  I have one quick question, are field hierarchies maintained when using this to overwrite an existing data source?  So if you log set up a hierarchy in Tableau, publish the workbook, and then use this tool to update the data source that was published, will the hierarchy created in Tableau be maintained?  I'm having a couple of issues using the tool and I'm wondering if this could be the cause...

Thanks for your help!

[alexjohnlittle]

Hi puttarajud,

You'll need to update the data sources in your Tableau workbook to those that have been created on Tableau Server from Alteryx Server.

Regards,

John.

[ashkhan]

Thanks for mentioning that one key checkbox 'Refresh Project Name List...' that needed to be unchecked.

It was driving me nuts, cause workflow will run and nothing will be published to Tableau.

[Falreign]

Hey JC why can't i find this Macro?

https://gallery.alteryx.com/#!search/publish%20to%20tableau%20server

It isnt in here!?

EDIT: I found it;

https://gallery.alteryx.com/#!app/Publish-to-Tableau-Server--Installer-/565b9ed8aa690a1254265b9c

[StephenW]

@falreign 

The Alteryx Starter Kit for Tableau contains the tool.  It will install it to a Tableau category in the tool palette . 

[sterlins]

Hi,

I'm trying to install the Publish to Tableau Server tool in Alteryx.  However my computer is on the D:\ drive, not the C:\ drive.  I've updated the workbase dependencies to reflect the correct drive, however I can't install because I still get the following errors:

Run command(26):  The external program "D:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe" returned an error code: 1

Run command(47):  The external program "D:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe" returned an error code: 1

I've confirmed that that drive exists.  Is there anything else I need to do in order to get it to work?

[JeremeyA]

We've been using this tool over a year with Tableau Server 9.3 and it worked great.  However, we just upgraded to Tableau server 10.1, and now we're having all sorts of issues, mainly with large data extracts....we get all sorts of authentication failure errors.  I am guessing its something on the Tableau side and we're working with that team, but anyone else having issues?  Perhaps something in the macro that might need to be updated for Tableau 10.1?

[iperich]

Hi, I have installed this tool but I can't write the data source to a Tableau Server. I'm using Tableau Server 10.1. The tool connects to the Tableau Server correctly with my user and pass, the tool retrieves the project names, etc. All seems to be ok but when I make it work alteryx says everything is ok, no errors at all, but the data source is not in the Tableau Server. (I refresh the page and there's no new Data Source)

I have noted that in the tool I can see the Publish_uploadSessionID, Publish_ResponseData, Publish_ResponseHeader, Signout_ResponseData
fields are empty, and the Signout_ResponseHeaders fields value is 

HTTP/1.1 204 No Content
Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2017 21:26:13 GMT
Server: Tableau
P3P: CP="NON"
X-UA-Compatible: IE=Edge
Content-Length: 0

I'm connecting with full URL, I've tried "create data source" and "overwrite data source", and also "request authentication token" (I don't know what else to do) and nothing works... 

I don't know what to do... any workarounds?

Thanks in advice!

[mtakka1]

@JCR, are there any updates coming to "Publish to Tableau Server" tool? This tool worked great until our Tableau Staging Server is upgraded to 10.3. This tool is working fine with 10.2

I receive the following error when I try to publish it to 10.3. 

At this point, I am not sure this is an error related to Tableau server upgrade or the tools needs some updates to accommodate the changes, if any. Please share if you have any updates regarding this.
Also, I was not able to find this tool in https://gallery.alteryx.com/#! (it keeps loading). 

[apolly]

Hi @mtakka1

We have just made an update to the Publish to Tableau Server macro. Please find it at the location below:

https://gallery.alteryx.com/#!app/Publish-to-Tableau-Server--Installer-/5926021ceffc2a0b7cc2bc44

Reach out if it does not solve your issue.

[adowsett]

Is there a configurable option in the macro which will have the data source published as an extract instead of live?  Apologies if I'm missing something obvious

[Bjorn]

Just started using this macro and even thought he "Append data source" output option is selected, it simply overwrites the data source with the new data. After some additional testing, it appears to work correctly when run manually from the design environment but once published and scheduled on the server, it overwrites the Tableau data source rather than appending. Is there a setting on the server that can control this?

[MPohlers]

@wgreig

Hierarchies that you create for a datasource in Tableau are saved as a .tds file. The publish to Tableau Server tool only uploads tde files to the server. Doing so it replaces the current combination of a tds file and an extract (a .tdsx) file with the simple tde. All your hierarchies, calculated fields, groups and so on are lost this way.

A huge improvement for this already great macro would be if the current .tds file could be kept.

This could be achieved by downloading the .tdsx files without the .tde (?noExtract=true), unpack the tdsx file, change the references in the xml of the tds (making it relative because it now links to a place on Tableau Server) and then packing it back together as a tdsx file. Uploading this tdsx file would now contain both the new data and the tds file and would be compressed additionally through the packaging.

[matthew_slaughter]

Hi @apolly.  I am trying to download the new upload to tableau server, but there is nothing in the gallery that you posted.  Do you know where I can find the new file?

Thanks!

[JessicaS]

Hi @matthew_slaughter

Can you try this link?

[apolly]

Hi All,

Jessica provided the updated link above or you can find below.

https://gallery.alteryx.com/#!app/Publish-to-Tableau-Server-Tool/599c93c8f499c7141c13a619

Alex Polly

[Bjorn]

Resolution update for my specific case. Turned out the server still had an older version of the publish to tableau plug-in that did not support the append option. After getting the server admin to upgrade, things are working as expected.

[apolly]

Hi @Bjorn,

Thank you for updating the thread with your resolution. I'll see if we can note this somewhere more prominent, that if experiencing similar issue to confirm the server has latest macro/tool as well.

Thanks again,

Alex Polly

[ranjith]

Hello All,

I have published .tde file on Tableau server using the above macro and it is working perfectly fine. The below picture shows the current process I am working on.

https://mixpixviz.blogspot.com/2016/03/row-level-security-on-published-tableau.html

1. So is there a way I can publish the .tde file using Alteryx with data source filters.

Thanks in advance.

Ranjith

[neeleshapatil1]

Is there any way we can publish the .tde file using Alteryx with data source filters?

[Chaitanya_Samanchi]

I'm trying to do same. But, the configuration window is different from what we have in the video. Can anyone suggest me what can be done in this case?

[MJ]

You've probably got the older version of the Publish to Tableau Server tool

[MJ]

I mean, the video shows the older version and you've got the new one...