I’m having trouble with my automation rules when I use a formula column as a trigger.
The situation is as follows: I have a table where certain information has to be filled out in two separate columns. When both columns have been filled out, I have a formula column with a checkbox that gets checked automatically.
I now want to trigger an automation rule whenever that checkbox gets checked. But for some reason, the rule fails to trigger.
If I set the trigger for one of the input columns, it fires when I type something in just fine.
Is it possible that formula columns don’t generate a modification event when they change?
You are correct. Changes to formulaic columns will not trigger automations. We’d like to support this in the future but for now, the best work around is to listen to the input columns.
Thanks for the reply. I tried setting the automation rules using the input columns, but I run into a different problem.
The rule triggers as expected now, but I am now evaluating the formulaic column in the condition step of the automation rule, where I get unexpected behaviour. The condition evaluates to false, even though replicating the same formula elsewhere returns true. This means that my automations are still not getting triggered, because of an error in evaluation in the second step. Is this a known bug?
I would be happy to share the specific document and circumstance where this occurs with you, if that helps.
Hi @preeyanka !
Did you found a way to use automation with formula? I’m currently trying to create a Time Blocking system with notifications, but I would need to trigger the notification when an row is changed by a formula like time<=now on a checklist.
And I don’t want to do things by hand as it is a notification system.
At this time, we have not built support for formulaic column driven triggers. However, you could use a time based trigger and an “IF” clause depending on how often you need to check for updates.
It’s very easy to get into situations that would trigger thousands of automations this way. Calculations are also not picked up the same as a physical edit, so it’s not likely this will be addressed in the near term.
What @preeyanka mentioned above is still the best route to go.