Linking forms to a dashboard

Question

Hi all,

I am new to smartsheet and could use some help.  My boss, who is no longer employed by the company, was in the process of setting up reports and dashboards so we can track the production off our converting lines.

He got 3 dashboards up and running before leaving, and now I am trying to finish the job but am completely new to this, and new to this software.

I know how to duplicate a dashboard, but I am having trouble linking the duplicated dashboard to pull the information off a new converting line.

The dashboards that are working properly are linked to a "metric sheet" that my former boss created, and the metric sheet is showing the accurate information off each line.

Can someone please explain it to me like I am 5 years old, on the steps I need to take to get these dashboards to pull the correct information from the metric sheet.

Thank you

S.Stone · Answer

@FibeFusaro just a few other links to help you as you continue learning!

Regardless of skill level, I recommend everyone check out the Help Center | Smartsheet Learning Center and bookmark specific topics they're interested to learn more about. Smartsheet University is also fantastic, and it was recently made available to all accounts! I recommend Working in Smartsheet to everyone and the Self-Paced Core App Learning Path for users who are building more complex Smartsheet solutions. If you've got the time or interest for videos, they have a Smartsheet - YouTube channel too.

I have found that I have learned the most about Smartsheet when I get my hands involved working my way through the sheets, reports, dashboards, and automations. So as you look through all of these resources and your existing sheets, play around and practice things to familiarize yourself with the interface and options little by little.

I hope that's helpful as you continue your Smartsheet journey!

S.Stone · Answer

@FibeFusaro once you've got the basic reports you need in your widgets, you want to open up the widget (top three dots on your widget) then edit from the widget settings menu on the right. This is where you'll select the correct data source and make any other changes needed.

So all of this assumes you have the reports already setup on the back end and you just need to point the widgets on the new dashboard to the correct reports. If you don't have the core reports setup, you can still have this drafted, but you'll need to take the extra steps to duplicate the reports you need to have them point to different sheets, columns, etc.

I'll stop there for this "tutorial" or sorts, but feel free to ping me for additional questions!

S.Stone · Answer

@FibeFusaro welcome to Smartsheet~

There's some different ways to handle this, depending on what you need. One way to effectively duplicate a dashboard is to use the pencil icon (edit) in the top-right corner of the existing dashboard. That will pop all of the widgets - the separate reports and links and things - for editing.

The first thing I would do is select all of them (you can drag your mouse over the whole area) and then Ctrl+C to copy. Then start a new dashboard and paste everything.

This new dashboard will have the exact widgets connected to the exact reports from the original dashboard.

There's more to go over to help you edit, but start there and grab the things you want and start getting them onto a new dashboard. If you need to point to new reports, you can do that in the next step.