Blueprint Issues

Nitish K

Raising this question to understand the impact of deleting existing blueprints in Control Center.

We currently have 14 blueprints configured. Some of these were created based on an older structure, specifically:

• Functional Management
• Workset C
• Workset for Copy
• Technical Management

Using these blueprints, multiple projects have already been provisioned in Smartsheet. Some of these projects are currently in an Active state, while others are Inactive.

We would like to understand the impact of deleting these older blueprints. Specifically, could you please confirm:

• What happens to projects that were already created using these blueprints?
• Will existing projects continue to function normally after the blueprint is deleted?
• Will there be any impact on:
  • Dashboards and dashboard linkages
  • Sheets, reports, or workflows
  • Cell links, cross-sheet references, or automations
  • Control Center global updates or project metadata
• Will deleting the blueprint affect access permissions or project provisioning history in any way?

Our goal is to clean up unused or legacy blueprints while ensuring there is no disruption to existing projects and reporting.

Please advise on the expected behavior and any recommended precautions before deletion.

Adrien Leduc

My understanding is that deleting a blueprint also deletes the associated projects. Because that's what I was told (by support), I haven't tried. In fact I believe you have to delete all the projects of the blueprints before you can delete the blueprint.

So you can either make your peace with that and just deactivate the automations for the blueprints you don't use anymore.

If you still insist on deleting your blueprints I think your only choice is to make duplicates of your projects folder/workspace, then deleting the originals (do this via the control center, don't delete manually the folders/workspace), make copies of your intake and summary sheets if you need to.

When you have deleted them all, you should be able to delete the blueprint. If you're not managing at that point (that can happen) reach out to support to help you.

To answer your questions:

Will existing projects continue to function normally after the blueprint is deleted?

They should be working, but as you make copies, you may need to change the permissions, depending on how it was set up before (as well a notification permissions)

Will there be any impact on:

Dashboards and dashboard linkages: No

Sheets, reports, or workflows: The reports if you had a report of all the projects yes as you deleted the originals, the reports inside your projects, no.

Cell links, cross-sheet references, or automations: No except the notification permission, but if there is an issue, you would get notifications that the automations can't run.

Control Center global updates or project metadata: yes since you've deleted the blueprint there can't be any more global update. I'm not sure what you mean by project metadata. If it's a sheet inside your project, no impact.

Will deleting the blueprint affect access permissions or project provisioning history in any way?

Since you made copies and deleted the originals, this is likely, yes.

I would also recommend you to check if there is an idea to "archive" blueprints open and vote for it, or to create it.