How do you surface an "About this sheet" blurb on a sheet?

Marc Shecter

Hi,

I'd like to have an "About this sheet" blurb on a sheet. That blurb would be a few sentences long. Ideally I would want a way to have a message popup to the user upon first entering the sheet, that they can dismiss and never see again; I don't think there's a way to do that in Smartsheet.

I'm considering Summary fields, but I don't see a way to make the summary fields pane open by default. Also, there's using and locking a row at the top of the sheet that has my blurb, but then it's always present.

I'm curious how others surface this kind of info to their users of a sheet.

Thanks,

Marc

Andrée Starå

Hi @Marc Shecter

I hope you're well and safe!

What I sometimes do in my client solutions.

• At the top of the sheet or where it makes sense, I'd add something like, Please have a look in the (one of the below options) for information about this sheet.
• Sheet Conversation Section
• Sheet Summary Section
• Comment on the row

Would that work/help?

I hope that helps!

Be safe, and have a fantastic week!

Best,

Andrée Starå | Workflow Consultant / CEO @ WORK BOLD

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Paul Newcome

You may need to look into some sort of third party app or the API, but I am not sure there is a way to create pop-ups even with that.

Marc Shecter

@Paul Newcome -- have you surfaced an "about this sheet" in any other way, using Smartsheet out of the box capabilities?

Paul Newcome

There is no way to do it with anything Smartsheet even with any of the premium apps. That's why I say that you MIGHT be able to do it with the API or a third party app, but even then I am not positive either of those options would work.

Marc Shecter

Sorry, what I mean, Paul, is how have you found the best way to provide information like that to your users about a sheet? (Not as a popup). Do you use a summary field? Do you put it in a locked row at the top? Something else?

Andrée Starå

Hi @Marc Shecter

I hope you're well and safe!

What I sometimes do in my client solutions.

• At the top of the sheet or where it makes sense, I'd add something like, Please have a look in the (one of the below options) for information about this sheet.
• Sheet Conversation Section
• Sheet Summary Section
• Comment on the row

Would that work/help?

I hope that helps!

Be safe, and have a fantastic week!

Best,

Andrée Starå | Workflow Consultant / CEO @ WORK BOLD

✅Did my post(s) help or answer your question or solve your problem? Please support the Community by marking it Insightful/Vote Up, Awesome, or/and as the accepted answer. It will make it easier for others to find a solution or help to answer!

Paul Newcome

I generally have it as a sheet summary field or I will use a rich text widget on a dashboard if I have them going through that first.

Marc Shecter

Paul - do you know if there's a way to have the summary panel open when a user first enters a sheet?

Paul Newcome

I haven't seen a way to do that natively within Smartsheet.

JCroz

I create a row at the top of the sheet and attach "how to use this sheet" instructions. But it's easy for users to miss.

Having a circle-i button next to the sheet title with customizable text and/or attachment for each sheet would be better.