Other users are making edits and they are showing as being made by me, the sheet creator.

David Z

I have a sheet set up that is shared to about a dozen or so people. We are using it to mark changes to products and moved the process to Smartsheet partially to have a more traceable process. The problem is occasionally when other users make edits they are showing as being made by me the sheet creator. It's happened with at least twice with two different people and potentially more often, the only reason I noticed these is because I have a workflow set up to send notification of changes. Has anyone else had similar issues here and does anyone know of a solution?

Kelly Moore

Hello @David Z

Help me understand your process. Are you using the modified and/or modified by field(s) to track the changes, and have you created any automation that is running on the sheet? Automation will change the modified/modified by fields.

David Z

Hi @Kelly Moore

I don't have any automations set up to alter the cells in these columns. I have several other automations for approval workflows, notifications etc. but they only update the drop down boxes and check boxes, not the text fields. I'm looking at the cell history and also have an automation set up to notify select people when updates are made. So that notification email came through saying I just made an update and the cell history and activity logs confirmed, even though I had not. Weird thing is, it doesn't look like any changes were actually made, the text before and after the change appears to be the same according to the activity log.

Kelly Moore

David

What is the trigger for the email notification automation?

Is the notification actually saying you made the change, or is the smartsheet notification email coming from you, ie Sender = David Z via Smartsheet

David Z

@Kelly Moore The trigger is if a row is added or updated so any change sends an email. But the notification is coming from David Z via Smartsheet, then when I right click the cell to look at the cell history it also shows me as having made the change. I also realized that I'm not the sheet creator, my boss initially set up the sheet and still is the owner, but I ended up being the one to make it actually run.

Kelly Moore

Hey David

Did you create the automation workflow? If so, I believe it has your name associated to it. I'm not sure though why the cell history shows your name - but before you said the values within the cell didn't appear to have changed, but the cell history showed your name

@Genevieve P. - could you help here please? I'm not sure what is by design and what may be a bug in the cell history.

David Z

Yeah I was the one to create it but normally when other people make changes it shows as coming from John Doe via Smartsheet it is just a few random ones that show up as coming through from me.

Genevieve P.

Hi @David Z

The emailed alert will have your name associated if multiple changes are made in the same timeframe by different users (it defaults to the Sheet Owner's name in this instance), see: Overview of Automated Notifications Sent via Smartsheet

However for the Cell History this is a different behaviour: is it possible that you have a formula set up on the sheet which is being recorded as "you" making a change?

David Z

There is only one sheet formula and that field hasn't been affected. I had a call with some support staff and we found one option that seemed to have some potential. I may have been in the sheet on an buried tab when rows were added and because the form adds rows to the top when the tab eventually refreshes or saves it's viewing the cells I had selected as having been updated. This would at least explain why the two entries of the cell history are the same.