Automation the 2nd time a cell is changed?

In an attempt to reduce the amount of emails and notifications that my coworkers have to read, I'm trying to create an automation that only triggers starting from the 2nd time a cell is changed.

I'm working with dates here and I'm looking for a way to basically ignore the cell change from blank to a date, and trigger an automation if it changes from the date first entered into another date.

Any help would be appreciated!!!

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Comments

Scott Willeke

Hi Chester,

Unfortunately we don't have a way to do that. Could you tell me more about what makes these alerts relevant? When are they most useful to the user?

I'm wondering if there another set of Conditions on other columns that you could use to have the alert sent only when it is relevant.

--

Scott Willeke | Smartsheet

Director of Product Management

Andrée Starå

Hi Chester,

The third-party service, Zapier could be an excellent option for this scenario. I haven't tested that specific workflow but I think it would be possible.

Also, I agree with Scott. What's the use case?

Is that an option for you?

Hope that helps!

Have a fantastic week!

Best,

Andrée Starå

Workflow Consultant / CEO @ WORK BOLD

Chester Guinto

Hey Scott,

I'd be glad to explain a bit more about my use case!

Basically, this is a standing sheet that we're constantly updating with requests and new jobs, and for our use case, we don't need notifications about a job being added onto the sheet or created. We only need to know if the due date from the job has changed or updated depending on whether or not something has been delayed.

The only columns on the row are Job Name, Assigned To, Due Date, and a checkbox column indicating job completion. Since we only care about whether the due date changes or not, I don't think there's another column to base the notification off of.

Looking at the automation settings, it doesn't look like there's a way to ignore the initial input of data or the creation of the row.

Scott Willeke

Chester:

Thanks for providing more information. You might consider adding an Original Due Date column that is set with the first due date. Then use another column such as Revised Due Date. Then you can trigger the workflow only if Revised Due Date is changed. Add a Condition Block to only kick off the actions in the workflow if Revised Due Date is not equal to Original Due Date.

With the condition in place, you can even put a formula in Revised Due Date that defaults to the Original Due Date and the workflow will only run if the revised Due Date changes.

Hope this helps!

—

Scott Willeke

Director of Product Management

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