Correct Formula Syntax for checking for excluding blank cells

I have a RAID log sheet where I want to add a helper column to capture the aging (duration) of each issue row that has not been marked as complete (and I want to convert the formula to a column formula). This sheet is generated for each project via our control center solution so there are several rows at the top of the sheet (for project summary info, etc…) that I essentially want the column formula to ignore since they are being used for summary info and don't actually contain project issue information.

Here is the original formula I used that did work to calculate the aging of each RAID row that had a status of other than complete:

=IF((Status@row <> "Complete"), TODAY() - Created@row )

But when I tried to add on to this formula to leave blanks for any rows that have no value in the status column, I just kept getting an unparseable error. I tried too many variations to list them all here, but here was the latest attempt. Where am I going wrong in my formula syntax?

=IF(ISBLANK([Status]@row ), “ ”, IF([Status]@row <> “Complete”, TODAY() - Created@row ))

See screenshots of actual sheet for reference.

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Accepted answers

Paul Newcome

The issue is with your "quotes". See how these and the ones in your original formula are striaght up and down, but the ones in your formula that isn't working are slanted? The slanted ones are called "Smart Quotes" which (ironically enough) aren't recognized as valid characters in Smartsheet formulas.

Try retyping them in Smartsheet or in a text editor such as Notepad (not Word) and see if that fixes the issue for you.

All comments

Paul Newcome

Try retyping them in Smartsheet or in a text editor such as Notepad (not Word) and see if that fixes the issue for you.

tiffany_smith

You are a lifesaver Paul, thank you!!! I've been staring at it for so long that I had gone blind to the smart quotes (they have gotten me in the past so I should have known better).

Paul Newcome

Happy to help. 👍️

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