Creating a Drill Down Table Structure in Alteryx

[jerry239]

Hello

I am new to Alteryx and just started learning it. I am trying to build a Drill Down Table Structure in Tableau through following below link:

https://www.phdata.io/blog/how-to-create-a-drill-down-table-in-tableau/

I successfully built it in Tableau but I am facing few but important limitation challenges in Tableau. So thinking if I can build an Alteryx workflow for the same which could help me in overcoming my challenges. The only difference between above information and my visualization is that I have textual data which like paragraphs. This data is shown in Quarterly manner which means I have different quarter columns instead of one single column in the paper.

Also, there can be a situation that my Level 3 could have more than one paragraph. I want to be able to give conditional color formatting to my paragraphs in a single cell.

Secondly, I need to attach few symbols at the start of my paragraph in Tableau

Lastly, I need my cells to have fit width capability so then long paragraphs would have bigger space as compared to others

can someone please help me in knowing if this is possible with the help of Alteryx and please guide me in building a workflow?

[caltang]

Hey @jerry239 ! I had some time and took a stab at it. I also made sure to unique the rows for you so you get values which are unique thereby not needing to concatenate in the pivot.

Let me know if this works. If it doesn't, let me know also and then I guess it's back to the drawing board on what you really want/need.

[jerry239]

Hello @caltang

Thank you so so much for looking into my query. I am trying to test the workflow output in Tableau and at the end, I used my output as Tableau Hyper file. But, I am not seeing any data in the file. Could you please help me in guiding what am I doing wrong so then I can use my table structure in Tableau and test it out?

Regards

Jerry

[caltang]

Hi Jerry - Render to Output is not possible because it’s not in the list of render outputs for hyper. Unless you convert the Excel file output into an input then output to Hyper or download the Tableau Connect tool on Alteryx Gallery. Try that & let me know.

[jerry239]

Hello @caltang 

I didn't connect it to Render but I directly connected it to the output of the union as Tableau Hyper file. Also, tried to use Render and it took a Temporary Excel file as an output. I want to specify the output location, how do I do that?

Can I directly use a tool which will give me an output from Alteryx?

[caltang]

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@jerry239 wrote:

Hello @caltang 

I didn't connect it to Render but I directly connected it to the output of the union as Tableau Hyper file. Also, tried to use Render and it took a Temporary Excel file as an output. I want to specify the output location, how do I do that?

Can I directly use a tool which will give me an output from Alteryx?

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You can use the standard output tool to choose the Hyper format for Alteryx output to Tableau. 

Re: Render tools you can also choose a permanent file type by clicking on the Render option - Render output as… then you can choose Excel 97 to a specific location.

[jerry239]

@caltang :

I did try to use the standard output tool and set the file format to 'Tableau Hyper File' after connecting it directly to the union but it didn't help. I don't have data being showed up and also, my data is so heavy that no Excel or CSV file is able to take it. Please help me in resolving this. I am stuck at this last output level.

[caltang]

Can you showcase what you’ve done? Screenshots etc. Not sure why you keep referencing Unions my friend - isn’t that what we did last time?

[jerry239]

@caltang 

sadly, I don't have my personal laptop right now and I can't even re-upload your shared workflow from my office worksystem. So, if you refer the last workflow which you shared with me, in the end we use a 'union' tool. From that, there are two outputs one is the 'browse' tool and the other one is 'render' tool. Because I wanted my output file to be Tableau extract file, so I connected the output of union tool to a standard output tool and set the file format to Tableau Hyper file and when I run it, it runs successfully. But when I opened Tableau to start working on the data, there's no data showing up from the extract of the Hyper file and just two lines coming in one column. Also, when I try to look at the output of my final table structure in the browse tool applied at the last of the alteryx workflow shared by you, I only see two lines which say, 'Table - View Browse Tool Report Tab'. My data is so heavy and I am not finding any solution.

I hope this explanation will help you understand my issue. Please please help me.

[caltang]

No need to apologise @jerry239 - I’m currently away on a business trip from my personal computer. But like I said, you cannot output with the normal Output tool. 

You need to go to REPORT tab above, then choose the Render Tool and replace the Output Tool with the Render Tool. 

In the Render Tool, choose the output type as permanent and choose Excel 97, and you can save it anywhere you want. 

Once you output it, make a new workflow - read that file as an input, then use the Output Tool to Tableau Hyperextract. You can then put it to Tableau. 

Please follow like above^

[jerry239]

Hello @caltang 

I think I have an older version of Alteryx because it's only showing me Output mode as Temporary and the only Excel option I have is 'Temporary Excel 2007 Spreadsheet'. :(

It's saving my file to a C drive and when I try to open it, it says there's some issue with the data. (maybe because data is heavy..!!)