How to use the result of a formula as a reference?

[Rolando_Guerrieri]

Hey there,

In a table, I have a column where the cells contain a formula displaying a result.
This result is a string and happens to be the name of rows/items of another table I want to reference.
How can I do that ?

It seems using “@” does not work in this case.

Thanks !

[Dalmo_Mendonca]

Maybe this will help:

Referencing Column Name from another table

I have figured it out! I used the switch statement to check the type of battery used and then summed the corresponding column in the Toys table. =Switch( thisRow.[Battery Type], "AAA", Toys.AAA.Sum(), "AA", Toys.AA.Sum(), "C", Toys.C.Sum(), "D", Toys.D.Sum(), "9V", Toys.9V.Sum() ) Thank you everyone again for your assistance in figuring this problem out. You guys are terrific! -Rick

[Rolando_Guerrieri]

I guess the switch function works when you have only a few possible values you need to transform into a reference. In my case it does not help.

The reason why and what I am trying to achieve is best explained in the framework of this discussion though

Dropdown Columns via a Lookup - How to change the order?

Currently by default if you create a drop-down column based on another table via ‘Lookup From Table’, the drop-down menu is in order of Row ID (essentially order of creation). Is there a way to change this? Simply changing the sort mode of the original table has no effect. In most scenarios you want the drop-down to be alphabetical for easy searching.

[Dalmo_Mendonca]

Sorry, I mistook rows for columns.

I replied to the specific case on the other thread.

Going back to the original question here:

Say you generate a string through a formula, you can use either Lookup or Filter to find the correspondent row from another table:

Keep in mind this is far from ideal and could create all sorts of problems. You’re better off with the direct references as you have them in your other doc.