Can I turn comma separated lists into multiple-choice dropdowns?

sarahsfocused

The title basically says it all. I have a column that was built in Excel, with multiple items separated by commas (no spaces) to make a string of about 1-5 items. We're moving our processes into Smartsheet, and I want this information to be formatted as a dropdown column with each item chosen as a separate entry.

Smartsheet doesn't seem to be able to support this very easily. Does anyone have a suggestion for a formula or other solution that would automate the multiple choice selection?

This is an oversimplified version, but what I'm looking to achieve:

Any help/thoughts would be appreciated! Just learning Smartsheets and it's an adventure for sure :)

SSFeatures

Hi @sarahsfocused,

I believe that https://ddupdate.com/ is a third party application that might solve this problem. I have never used it before and I cannot vouch for it in anyway whatsoever.

Other than that, I found this thread which seems similar to this one:

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/107082/automatic-update-of-dropdown-list

I don't think it's possible within SmartSheet at the moment. You can use the SmartSheet API, which is what DDUpdate does. The SmartSheet API is free, so if you have a coder on your team, they can implement it without needing a third party app. Additionally, the thread mentions that you can use Data Shuttle to solve the problem.

Hope this helps!

SSFeatures

Hi @sarahsfocused,

I believe that https://ddupdate.com/ is a third party application that might solve this problem. I have never used it before and I cannot vouch for it in anyway whatsoever.

Other than that, I found this thread which seems similar to this one:

https://community.smartsheet.com/discussion/107082/automatic-update-of-dropdown-list

I don't think it's possible within SmartSheet at the moment. You can use the SmartSheet API, which is what DDUpdate does. The SmartSheet API is free, so if you have a coder on your team, they can implement it without needing a third party app. Additionally, the thread mentions that you can use Data Shuttle to solve the problem.

Hope this helps!

sarahsfocused

Thank you @SSFeatures ! Slightly unfortunate, it seems like it should be pretty easy in other programs. But good to know what's possible now, and that people would like to see something like this in the future. Thanks for the response!

SSFeatures

You're welcome, glad I could help!