Increased Cell references

Art Schneiderheinze

Anyone know when (or if) Smartsheet plans to increase the number of cross-sheet cell references? I am getting this message now in my sheet, and its frustrating because I feel I have only started to truly make my sheet smart and truly useful.

Does anyone have any "best practices" to share? I am currently referencing 5 or 6 other sheets, and have tried to be strategic in those other sheets by moving columns close (so the range is smaller and thus fewer cells referenced) and repeating ranges (rather than creating new ones) thinking this would help as well.

Any ideas, comments, or support would be GREATLY appreciated.

L_123

i've found index(match(),match() really helps.

My worst case scenario when I ran out of links what I did is used join(collect()) to basically gather the entire sheet into one cell/column then parsed the information out.

Art Schneiderheinze

Same here---as I have read the vlookup is especially difficult to use within cell reference limitations. I've used the JOIN/COLLECT in some instances and it has been a great function to use.

Even with my INDEX/MATCH and JOIN/COLLECT, I'm still getting the message about surpassing the cell reference limit. I am not sure if it is entirely accurate, because after a few minutes everything appears in the sheet, it has just really slowed down and I get a #CALCULATING message, at least for the first few minutes.

I ABSOLUTELY love using Smartsheet, so I hope that I can use some of these strategies effectively and perhaps in time they find ways to speed up the processing of cell referencing (and increase the limit).

Josh Garcia

I don't have an answer, but I've been following this related thread for some time now:

 

https://community.smartsheet.com/comment/177796?utm_source=comm-notification&utm_medium=email#comment-177796

Andrée Starå

Hi,

There has been chatter around increasing the number of columns and rows at last years Engage I think. No promises were made!

Let's hope It's ready for this years Engage!

Have a fantastic day!

Best,

Andrée Starå

Workflow Consultant @ Get Done Consulting

L_123

I've also used join(collect()) with an autonumber column to filter results out of multiple pages. I've divided sheets up into 4 sheets and parsed them back together with reports too. and even combined the two methods.