Having only had a mentions of Alteryx here and there, this was uncharted waters for me. The influx of information throughout the first days at the Data School seemed overwhelming. A thought that frequently came to mind was ‘when do ‘enough tools’ become ‘too many tools’?’ when navigating the never-ending options to choose from. However, having reflected on what we had learnt and created at the end of the day, it all appeared less daunting as I had a tighter grasp of the concept of each tool we used. This aligned with the promise that the more you handle Alteryx, the easier it becomes: something I am now reiterating myself. I also realized that having a multitude of tools to choose from actually increases flexibility when designing your workflow, as there can be multiple functions that allow you to reach your goal.
Below are my take-home messages that I found the most useful from my first week learning Alteryx: taking me from a sense of panic to professionalism.
Tips when using Alteryx:
Use the browse tool to preview your data (shortcut: ‘Ctrl’ + ‘Shift’ + ‘B’), allowing you to pinpoint any errors, or to check that a function has worked.
Make sure to view the ‘output’ anchor, rather than the ‘input’ anchor, otherwise you will not be able to see what has been run/think it hasn’t worked.
Annotate your thought process as you work so you can quickly understand what each tool has done/your intension.
Get stuck into Alteryx challenges to build confidence and practice (link to challenges: https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Weekly-Challenge/bd-p/weeklychallenge)
Lessons learnt:
Save EACH individual window…otherwise your work will not save.
Ask anyone for help when you are unsure; everyone is always willing to help.
Some tool functions to remember:
Summarize: Can focus on one or multiple columns with ‘group by’ and can perform simple aggregations.
Filter: Choose a value (within a row) to filter the rest of your data (all corresponding columns) according to that value. This will produce a dataset with all the filtered values (true), and a dataset without (false), depending on how you choose to filter.
Select: Can select which columns you want in the dataset, as well as change the type of data (string, integer etc.).
Formula: Allows you to create your own calculations with respect to original columns, or create new columns.
Sort: Allows the order of your rows to change by highest or lowest first integer/double), or by alphabetical order (string)
Join: Can bring two different datasets together, as long as there are common fields between the data.
Targets to set myself:
Complete at least 2 weekly Alteryx challenges every week. This number can increase as confidence builds.
Write at least 1 weekly blog post to document what I have learnt and my journey through the Data School.