Notifications for cell value changes? (ie: not new values into a blank cell)

Christa Johnson

How can I send a notification when a cell value changes? I am defining "change" as there being a value in a cell (ie: not blank) and then a new value is entered in.

Mike TV

@Christa Johnson

The trigger settings can let you set it so when a row changes and a specific cell value changes to "any value" it can trigger an action. However, that would also trigger when the cell receives a new value and WAS blank before. I really don't think this will work but you could try it:

Christa Johnson

Thanks so much Mike - I was thinking this might work too, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to look at it sequentially.

Mike TV

@Christa Johnson

Here's a work around I just thought of. Create a helper column which you can hide on the sheet. Put in the formula:

=IF(NOT(ISBLANK([Column]@row)), 1, 0)

For the above formula, [Column]@row would be whichever column we are making sure there's already a value in. So then on your automation you can set the condition to trigger if the helper column is checked.

Based on the same behavior as our previous attempt, it shouldn't trigger the automation when the column is blank. It should only be sending the notification if there's a change and that box was already checked before.

Mike TV

@Christa Johnson

I forgot to mention, that helper column should be a checkbox column.