Prevent deletion of rows if it contains locked cells?

Sameer Shetty

This feauture gets my vote. We have had incidencts in the past where new users have inadvertently made changes to cells they shouldnt have. 

 

Brad Jones, 

Till we're able to secure the sheets,  i would really appreaciate your input on a any method you employ to cross check that the current version of your SS tallies with your authorised version. 

Brad Jones

It was needed 18months ago when it was brought up in the forum here.  And it is one great big data security flaw.  Keep beating the drum everyone.  This is not a feature request, it's a long overdue FIX DEMAND.

Lenka Horanska

Absolutely agree with Brad, it is a major flaw and we ned it fixed ASAP please. 

Brad Jones

@Sameer,

 

The only thing I have currently in place as an 'automatic' check for deletions is to have a filter rule set in my Outlook which puts a copy of any email containing "deleted row".  It does not stop things from happening, but it allows me a quicker response time to any deletions.

Sameer Shetty

Thanks Brad, that helps

Brad Jones

Hello Smartsheet.

 

Just a reminder that this is still a very painful issue that we would like resolved.  We love the new features that you offer us, but the flaw that has been present in the software for the past 1.5 years really needs to be fixed now.  I would gladly forego some of these nifty upgrades if we had the ability to stop users from deleting locked information.

The proposed solutions have been numerous, plausible, and reasonable.  Please fix this problem.  
Prefereably in your next release.

Galen Garrison, PMP, CSM, MBA

I spent 5 hours yesterday recreating ~150 rows that were deleted yesterday. He thought he was modifying a new copy of an existing template, but he was mistaken. I have since demoted him to viewer rights, but there is no way to protect rows in Smartsheet from deletion while still permitting editing of values within rows. Additional, to my knowledge, there is no way to restore to a previous version. I have Alerts enabled to notify me of any changes and providing me with details of what was removed; however, I am loathe to share a Smartsheet with a customer for input when I cannot limit them to a particular cell over which they have reporting responsibilities. Should they fall behind on their tasks and want to eliminate the evidence, voila, just delete the row. All version history of the cells magically disappears. I can recreate the row and its values but not the version history. I agree with Brad in that this is not a request for a feature but a request to fix a flaw (or perhaps a missed requirement) and eliminate a rather serious risk for sharing across multiple business entities that collaborate on a project but sometimes have competing or opposite agendas.

Marilyn Doane

I vote for this fix too. Far too often we have had this happen.

Brad Jones

Still waiting for a solution to this problem.  This can be solved in so many ways, but still the problem persists.  Please fix this Smartsheet.

Galen Garrison, PMP, CSM, MBA

Smartsheet, you have to admire Brad's persistance! I think that Brad has a Smartsheet that sends him a reminder to remind you that this is still a desired feature/fix. If not for the rest of us, do it for Brad. Pretty please? 

Tamara K

Please add my vote! I agree it's surprising that this is not already a thing. A new user type that can ONLY edit unlocked cells but cannot delete rows or columns is crucial to secure many workflows. 

 

If I could run everything through a form to protect end-users from themselves, I totally would, but that's just not always possible.

Shaine Greenwood

@brad, @galen, @tamara—I've logged your votes for a sharing permission level that prevents people from deleting locked rows. 

 

Right now as a workaround, I recommend creating a report and having your people work off of that. The upsides to this are that you can include multiple sheets, and people can't delete a row from a report.

 

The downsides are that sheets must still be opened by someone and saved for the latest data to appear in the report, hierarchy can't be displayed, and you still need to share the source sheets to people—so you'll have to encourage them to look at the report instead. 

Tamara K

Thanks @shaine.

To clarify, in one of my scenarios, new rows are being added via form, so it's not just locked rows that I want to prevent certain users from deleting, it's ALL rows. (If it were only locked rows, I'd have to constantly go in and lock newly-added rows, which is a headache.)

 

Also, thanks for the workaround, but I'm not sure I understand. My shared users need to be able to edit certain cells but not delete rows. Are you saying that they can edit cells via a report and have that data write back to the originating sheet? That doesn't sound right, so I'm sure I'm misunderstanding you (or maybe your workaround doesn't apply to my scenario.)

J. Craig Williams

Tamara,

 

Yes, a Report allows the user to update certain cells.

Formulas, some project dependency relatate columns, and other limitations, but in general, yes.

 

Craig

Tamara K

Thanks Craig - I had no idea! Going to play with this now.