Outlook 365 Tool

[#1]

Microsoft Outlook 365 Help Page

Outlook 365 Input tool allows you to read emails and calendar events, and download email attachments from a personal or a shared Outlook 365 account.

Current version

Microsoft Outlook 365 Tool v1.2.0 (September 15, 2023)

• Compatible with Designer and Server 2021.4.2 Patch 6, 2022.1 Patch 4 and later.

• Compatible with AMP engine only.

• Added support for DCM.

  • DCM is required for running this connector on Alteryx Server.

• FIPS capable.

• Added new calendar intervals.

• Fixed issue where Outlook 365 Input failed to read emails with .msg attachments. (TPM-2151)

• Fixed issue where search didn’t work for certain query parameters. (TPM-523)

• Minor bugfixes and improvements.

Previous version

Microsoft Outlook 365 Tool v1.1.0 (September 5, 2022)

• Authentication occurs using user's browser instead of embedded CEF in Designer to comply with modern security policies.

• Compatible with Alteryx Designer version 2021.4 and later

Microsoft Outlook 365 Tool v1.0.0 (February 2, 2022)

• Compatible with Alteryx Designer version 2021.4 and later.

• Initial release.

• Built-in multitenant Azure App with an option to use custom Azure App (incl. single tenant app).

• Requires Outlook 365 account..

• Proxy support.

This tool uses a .yxi file format. A .yxi file is a package that includes an Alteryx Tool and all of its dependencies zipped into a single file. When this file is imported into Alteryx, the tool is added to the tool palette in the category specified by the tool.

When sharing a workflow that uses a .yxi tool, the tool is not included and must be installed by the recipient.

[Landon_Holbrook]

Hi,

Do you know what this error means? 

[r4upadhye]

Works well, thanks.

[helpfultoaster]

@Landon_HolbrookThat looks like an install error that could be related to network/anti-virus restrictions. Please reach out to Customer Support for a pre-installed copy of the tool.

[jasonreadcox]

Alteryx Designer Version: 2021.3.2.54175

I cannot authenticate successfully. The "Connect" process appears to work as expected but after I have supplied my credentials (including MFA), I am left with only a blank floating window and the tool does not recognize that the login was successful. Here are screenshots of the process and result:

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

6. The source of this blank html page is:

I've also set up an app in Azure according to instructions here https://help.alteryx.com/20214/designer/microsoft-outlook-365 and I end up with the same blank window despite an apparent successful authentication.

Any ideas what I am doing wrong?  I believe I've eliminated all potential firewall and antivirus culprits.  We aren't using a proxy...  

[mjackey]

Any update on the blank screen after authentication?
Today we updated to version Version: 2021.3.3.63061.  In the old version this was working and it stopped working after the update.

[jasonreadcox]

@mjackey - Unfortunately no.  I haven't heard from anyone about this and I am still having the same problem.

[mjackey]

@jasonreadcox Thanks for the reply.

In this post near the bottom rpaugh says that it is a bug in the version of alteryx and to upgrade or downgrade to get it to work which makes sense because it was working before we upgraded today.

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Public-Community-Gallery/Outlook-Input-Tool/ta-p/883455

[jasonreadcox]

@mjackey - Which version were you running when it worked?  Its never worked for me so I don't know what version to downgrade to.  I am running 2021.3.2.54175 currently.

[mjackey]

@jasonreadcox 2020.2.3.27789

[taxguy33]

Alteryx Designer Version: 2021.4.2.02731

I cannot authenticate successfully (the error message on the tool says only "Failed to Authenticate". Unlike @jasonreadcox 's issue where he got the "Blank Floating Window (I was getting that on @rpaugh 's latest public gallery version of his O365 tool with no resolution), I seem to connect to my O365 account properly (using the Internet Browser option) after entering in credentials and completing MFA. As you can see - the tool is connect to my Inbox and my Shared Mailbox accounts (you can see the subfolders in my Alteryx shared mailbox) - but all I get is the "Failed to Authenticate" issue when running the tool.

Has anyone run into this and how did you get past it? Did you have to get company IT involved to unblock anything (not even sure where to start on that)? Or did you go straight to the Azure app option?

Error message plus screenshot showing a connection to O365 has been established. Very vague about what is occurring faltering

[taxguy33]

I am getting this image saying the Refresh Token is expired and is only allowed to work for 24 hrs before it needs refreshed. Does anyone know how to extend this setting? It is really burdensome to have to refresh these tokens every day - would love to have it be 90 days or more. If I went down the "Provide Client ID, Client Secret and Tenant ID" route - would I be able to extend the life of this token instead of the "Sign In via Internet Browser" that seems to limit to 90 days?

Thanks!

[davidhe]

@taxguy33 you're going to want to leverage the Azure app registration route. 

[QuantumViridis]

@davidhe

I am using the Azure app registration route and have the same problem.  Since I am running the workflow on my server, reconnecting daily is not feasible.  Is there a solution?

[Paul_Holden]

Is it possible to publish workflows using this tool to the Gallery?

If so how is authentication managed for unattended (scheduled) runs?

[EDIT]

Ah, okay, I came here from this page...

https://help.alteryx.com/20221/designer/outlook-365-input-tool

But I now see that the help page in the tool description is different...

https://help.alteryx.com/20221/designer/microsoft-outlook-365

What I'm not clear on is exactly how these two sets of information relate to each other and exactly what I need to tell our users they need to build in order to keep the workflows that were running fine under on-prem Exchange working for O365.

Sorry if I'm being dumb here, any help appreciated.

[mfresques]

@davidhe, @taxguy33  I'm running into the same problem with having to refresh the token every 24hrs.  Did you ever get this resolved?  

[taxguy33]

Yes, I followed @davidhe  advice and went down the Azure app registration process and created a "client secret token" for 6 months and have had 0 issues thus far. It did take a little back and forth with the IT team to make sure the calls to this app were not being blocked by our firewalls, but smooth sailing after this convo.

[mfresques]

@taxguy33  I've generated a client secret token but now the outlook tool is failing to authenticate.  Did you get this error when you had the firewall issue? 

[Wrigh6s]

Anyone else having issues downloading the file? Gets to 18Mb then stops and says server issues?

[davidhe]

great to hear @taxguy33 !

[hornungr]

This connector is definitely a step in the right direction, but is it correct to say that the only way it will work on the gallery is if our IT group registers an Azure app (with service principal)?  And from what I understand, an Azure App would have to be registered for each user since the service principal approach would explicitly grant privileges to certain mailbox(es).  It would not delegate or impersonate privileges based on the Alteryx user.

What I'd like to see is for this connector to act more like the Power BI output tool.  In that case, there was a 'pre built' azure app for the Alteryx to Power BI connection that had to be approved by our O365 tenant admin one time.  From there anyone that used the add-in and would only see what their own O365 account is privy to...I've heard this described as the 'delegation' feature.  Another bonus with this approach is there's no client id/secret required.

Before submitting this as an 'idea', I wanted to make sure what I described is correct.  Has anyone gotten this add-in to work in the gallery for multiple users without having to register an azure app for each user to use with their email account (or without having them share a single client id/secret that's privy to all accounts...definitely not an option for us)?

[JadeB]

Having trouble downloading the tool. Does anyone know what this error means?

[Paul_Holden]

Hi,

Cross posted from the thread on installing tools for workflows running on server - apologies if that's not allowed.

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Server-Knowledge-Base/Error-Unable-to-resolve-plugin-Python...

My users are getting the following error when they publish workflows to the server:

Unable to resolve plugin Python 'Outlook365Inputv1.0.0\main.py'

I have installed the Outlook tool on the server in Designer using the service account which is a member of the local administrators group for the server.

I have installed the Outlook tool on the server running Designer as admin and selecting "Install for all" via my personal domain account which is a member of the local administrators group for the server.

I have restarted the alteryx service

I have restarted the server (Windows o/s restart)

Any ideas gratefully accepted.

[EDIT]

To me this seems to be either authorisation or path issues preventing the workflow from accessing/finding the python module?

Right now I'm focusing on the install location. Our server setting for Global workspace is D:\AlteryxProgramData

But the tool has been installed to C:\ProgramData\Alteryx\Tools

I'm looking for more information as to where the workers look for tool code as I can't find any way so far to control where the tool gets installed.

Thanks

Paul

[Paul_Holden]

I finally figured this out as I was able to add the tool in Designer on the server to a workflow where the existing tools were not showing/working correctly.

I checked the XML and only then noticed that my users have

Outlook365Input_v1.0.0

Whereas on the server I have installed

Outlook365Input_v1.1.0

I'm slightly annoyed that the plugin methodology for this means that we have to replace all of the tools in the already created workflows to get this working but it is what it is.

[hornungr]

@Paul_Holden - Glad you got your issue fixed.  I'd be curious if you've had much success using the new Outlook 365 tool on a gallery server.  We ran into issues (with the v1.0.0 connector) where it would run fine on the gallery after initial publish but the token would then expire the next day.  After opening a support case we found that the connection must use a service principal account with client id/secret to avoid this problem.

We've since worked with our tenant admins to setup the service principal (with client secret specified in the connection) but haven't had much getting it to work thus far...even just from the designer client.  Wondering if you took this approach & have had any luck running from the gallery server?

[Paul_Holden]

@hornungr this is exactly my next challenge.

We faced a similar challenge with the previous community version of the tool from @rpaugh (thanks again for all the work on that previous tool) and in the end we decided to run the required workflow from Designer since it is only used by a team which includes an embedded Alteryx developer. We don't see this as sustainable going forwards, and we expect more demand for this tool going forwards, hence we are now trying to get it running on the server as part of our upgrade to 2022v1.

[hornungr]

UPDATE:  We noticed version 1.1.0 was released a few weeks ago with a slight update to the general Outlook 365 tool page to include this statement: "You can use the default Alteryx application (Sign in via Internet Browser) to schedule workflows for up to 6 months.".

Without a lot of fanfare, it appears that Alteryx released an update that no longer requires registering an Azure App (nor svc principal) to schedule on the gallery.  Although I really wish Alteryx would've advertised this better on community threads like this, it does seem to solve a lot of problems for us!

[Paul_Holden]

@hornungr  I saw that as well but I'm not really clear what it means.

"You can use the default Alteryx application (Sign in via Internet Browser) to schedule workflows for up to 6 months.".

...is this saying to run a workflow in Designer on the worker (? Controller?) and the generated token will be valid for 6 months for all jobs?

[hornungr]

@Paul_Holden-  We're able to simply publish a workflow from designer (running on the client machine, not worker) and the workflow executes successfully on the gallery beyond the 24-hour token expiration we had previously run into.  And this is using the standard browser auth option in designer; no client, secret or service principal required.

As far as what we'll need to do after 60 days, I'm not sure yet but would assume the workflow will have to be republished to establish the new token.

[Paul_Holden]

@hornungr  thank you so much. I just have not had the time to test this (also I don't write workflows myself so I rely on being able to get some developer time for testing) so this is a huge help to me.

[Jafar]

I have downloaded and configured the tool.

However, when I execute it with using Data Option i.e. (Check - Download attachments from emails), getting an error "Error: Outlook 365 Input (1): Failed to fetch emails data. Check your settings and try again."

When I untick the option I am not getting any error.

I need to alteryx to read the attachments and display the result for CSV/Excel.

[Paul_Holden]

@Jafar 

Have you checked the mailbox permissions with your Exchange team?

I don't know how granular they are but you may find that whilst your account has permissions to view the mailbox it doesn't have permissions to download attachments?

Disclaimer: I am not an Exchange admin so this might be rubbish!

Regards,

Paul

[VijayGopal]

Hi All,

I also ran into same issue, any has solution for this.

[EWarmestad]

Hi

We are planning to pull out multiple calendar with the Outlook - 365 input, and have set the settings for the company that all calendars is shared, and we have manage to pull out the calendar using excel or power BI. 

But for some reason we are getting the following error:

We have manage to pull out the same calendars in excel. Does anybody have a god ide how to solve the issue? 

We even experienced that one day we hade connection to the calendar, and the next day we did not. 

[taxguy33]

Has anyone had any success using the "Download Attachments from emails" option to be able to download .eml or .msg (Outlook emails attached to an email) tools? I keep getting errors whenever my specific Inbox has an email with .msg attachments within. I have had success download all sorts of .csv, .xls, .xlsx and .xlsm files types but not .msg files.

Any guidance on why you think this might be happening or how to rectify the issue? If not, can we suggest that as a tweak to v3 of the Tool to allow email attachments (.msg) to be downloaded without issue?

Thanks

@taxguy33 

[bkclaw113]

Great tool, thanks for publishing it!

[MReplogle1]

Does anyone know how to use this connector to download and save attachment that will replace an existing file with the latest updated one? 

My use case is that I have a schedule export tickets daily from ServiceNow into my outlook. (since that connector really doesn't work) I want to take these exported files and overwrite the previous days file to get the latest tickets and status. 

When I initially setup the Outlook connector in Alteryx - it will download the files and save them each day in a separate folder with a specific date. (example attached)  This does work because the Alteryx workflow I setup to transform that same data does realized the path since it changes each day...

Can anyone help?

[donne4real]

@MReplogle1 I am running into the same issue. I need to be able to extract the attachments from each folder and I have been unsuccessful with that so far. 

[ddean]

I am having the same issues as several posts above: I cannot download attachments. I received the following when checking the "Download attachments from email" box:  Error: Outlook 365 Input (1): Failed to fetch emails data. Check your settings and try again. I don't receive an error when the checkbox is not checked and I am able to view the email details.

[taxguy33]

@ddean  I would bet you have an invalid attachment type in some of the emails that you are attempting to download attachments for (likely culprits are .msg or .eml types). If you isolate those emails with bad attachments from the Folder you are attempting to download attachments from, I would bet it saves them successfully. Not ideal, but at least shows that the download feature does work in certain specific scenarios.

[leonhekkert]

I've managed to create a connection through 'Sign in via Internet Browser' but for some reason the Select Folder part of the configuration windows gets stuck / keeps loading. Due to this I cannot retrieve data with this input tool.

Does anyone have an idea what could be the cause of this?

[Dominik2806]

We plan to roll out this tool for our Alteryx Users, but without a silent installation mode this will become cumbersome. Does anyone out there know, if there is a possibility to install the tool, for example, from command line?

I would really appreciate your thoughts!

Thanks a lot!

[Paul_Holden]

@Dominik2806 

This thread suggests that there is now a solution for this. Not dug into the details I'm afraid...

https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Designer-Desktop-Ideas/Add-command-line-installation-of-YXI...

Tool would need to be compatible with the latest SDK - which I can't confirm.

[taichirofukumoto]

Would you show me what kind of items does this tool can extract from outlook email?
I could not find full list of items which this tool can extract.
I want to create dataset which contains email's various data and analyze it.

[abhilash_t]

I am using Custom App CID, TID and Secret to access emails with version 1.2.0 as I want to use DCM. But I am getting "Failed to read port assignment" and "Deadlock detected" error. It is working with version 1.1.0 without DCM. 

I believe DCM configuration custom app only asks for CID, TID and Secret however it should ask for Username and Password as well.

Is anyone able to connect using DCM > Custom App? Can you help me resolve this issue?

I am using Designer version 2022.3.1.486 Patch- 3

Many thanks in advance.

[I_CSC]

Hi ALL,

I am trying to read emails through the outlook tool.

I keep facing an error that is attached to this message.

Please let me know how to tackle it.