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How to update records returned in find record step

  • July 11, 2022
  • 4 replies
  • 96 views
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I have created a table to import Google Analytics data. It contains 500 records with relative URLs and total page views.

I then want to use an automation to do the equivalent of a VLOOPUP on the URLs to find matches in a content table.

When there is a match, I want to Update the content table record and insert the page view

If I do Update Record after the Find Record step, it tries to run 500 updates and most fail.

If I add Update Record under Conditional Actions, I would expect to be able to pass along the IDs from the Find Record step and just update those. However - though this passes in Test Step and returns a value for page views, it doesn’t get written to the record.

What am I doing wrong?

Thanks for looking!

4 replies

ScottWorld
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  • ScottWorld
  • Genius
  • July 11, 2022

Unfortunately, Airtable doesn’t loop through the found records after a “find records” action. Be sure to email this as a feature suggestion to support@airtable.com and let them know how important this is to you.

Your only options are:

  1. Write a custom JavaScript.

  2. Use an automation tool like Make.com, which always loops through your records individually after finding records.

  3. Use the workaround that I describe in the podcast below:

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  • David_Nunn
  • Author
  • Known Participant
  • July 11, 2022

Thank you @ScottWorld
I watched the podcast and it is very interesting! However, if I understand correctly, it can only work with a single table.

I need to know the IDs of records to update in one table, plus the corresponding data value to insert from the second table.

I don’t think that can work?

ScottWorld
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  • ScottWorld
  • Genius
  • July 11, 2022

Thank you @ScottWorld
I watched the podcast and it is very interesting! However, if I understand correctly, it can only work with a single table.

I need to know the IDs of records to update in one table, plus the corresponding data value to insert from the second table.

I don’t think that can work?


I’m not sure I understand your situation well enough to let you know if you can do it or not. You probably could do it, but you would likely require 2 or more automations to do it.

You would definitely have more control over what you’re looking to do by writing your own scripts or using a tool like Make which gives you fine-tune control over everything.

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  • David_Nunn
  • Author
  • Known Participant
  • July 12, 2022

Hi Scott. I went back and had another try using the approach you demonstrated. I did get it to work consistent, but with errors. After many hours I couldn’t get rid of these, although the data seemed accurate, the email alerts from the failed processes was a nuisance. I also just don’t like know why stuff doesn’t work!

Much as I’ve enjoyed grappling with this problem, I’ve just had a demo from Fetch Data, and I think I will go with that as it will be easier for colleagues to maintain.

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