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Solved!
I built a solution for Part 1 that worked where I used non-macro Tools to check the rows & columns. Then I built a macro for the diagonals. Then I re-did part 1 and the macro so it could handle all 9 directions (counting not moving as a direction.... I guess I should've excluded those. Drat!)
Then Part 2 didn't need any tweaks to the macro (woohoo!) and involved an extra filter at the end.
I used a Text Input file for the values I was trying to get - e.g. "X", then "XM", then "XMA", etc. I feel like I could've done that differently but it also worked beautifully for Part 2 without any macro tweaks, so I think I'm calling that a win.
In past years, I've always solved problems like these with spatial tools. Wanted to try something different
For part 1, built 4 letter words going horizontally, vertically, diagonally (both directions), and then found matches to XMAS on reversed words as well
For part 2, built 3x3 blocks of letters, building 3-letter blocks horizontally, and then matching three consecutive rows before concatenating them. Used RegexCountMatches as a bit of a brute force way to find the matching patterns.
and here is the accompanying python - part 1 is pretty awful, part 2 is sweet.
all code at SeanAdams10/AdventOfCodePython: Advent of code challenges in Python - across multiple years
Today was pretty fun...diagonal considerations through Alteryx aren't exactly straightforward but I bet they are harder with other tools!
The iterative macro is a wonderful thing! And for me, today was the first time Part 2 was way easier for me than Part 1! Once again....and I don't think this is a spoiler but when using Regex....
Also, here are my screenshots
