Unable to Open Flow File When Connecting to Files in a Shared Folder

Issue

An error will occur opening a Flow file:

"There was a problem opening the flow file. There might be a problem with the file path, file extension or the data may be corrupt."

User-added image

Environment

Tableau Prep Builder
Windows 10
Shared folder

Resolution

Copy and paste the shared folder path to Windows File Explorer. If access is required, this means you could not use the Windows account on this local machine to access the files in the Flow.

Please consider the following options for this issue.

Option 1:
Work with your Network Team to grant access permission from the local machine to the shared folder.

Option 2:
Use another machine that has access to the shared folder to open and edit the flow.

Cause

The Flow is using files in a shared folder as input, and the end user does not have access to the shared folder.

Additional Information

The Flow could be opened and run on Tableau Server or Tableau Cloud but could not be opened on a local machine.

The log.txt file contained an error such as:

2022-06-14T17:02:27.374: 27340-4660 EXCP
is-local-configuration-error : False
dse-type : Unknown
sql_state :
is-capability-probe-failure : False
connectivity_stage : ConnectivityStage::Unknown
msg : ConnectivityException::Init
excp-type : ConnectivityException
is-bad-request : False
excp-msg : Unable to connect to the file "\\shared folder\tableau\XXXXX\fileName.xlsx". Check that the file exists and that you have sufficient access privileges for it.
is-remote-configuration-error : False
2022-06-14T17:02:27.374: 27340-4660 EXCP
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