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Hi all. I am pretty new to working with AirTable but have managed to figure out most of what I need to know thanks to the documentation and this community! I have one question by which I am flummoxed, however: linked record filtering.

We have a base with a bunch of different tables in it, including one for Team Members and one for Tasks. In the Tasks table we have a field for Status, which is a single-select field with four options: Not Started, In Progress, Completed, and Deferred. Tasks also has a field that allows them to be linked to particular team members.

In the Team Members table we have a field that pulls in all of the tasks associated with a team member. I’d like that field to be filtered by task status, so that only tasks that are not completed are shown. I’d think that turning on “Filter record selection by a condition”  and using a static filter like this would work:

Filter record selection by a condition, connected to task status

It isn’t actually filtering, though; all tasks get pulled into the field. Do I need to let all tasks get pulled in and then create a lookup field that can be used to filter inside a view? I’m unclear on the logical flow. Thanks for any help anyone can provide!
 

Hey ​@kfitz,

Exactly! You do not want to set the filter on the actual linked record field (that will only work looking forward for linking of new tasks. Hence the “filter record selection”). You want to create a lookup field, and set the condition on such lookup field! You can check this post to see how to do exactly what you are looking for.

If you need any help, please feel free to grab a slot and I’d be happy to show you around.

Mike, Consultant @ Automatic Nation 

Do I need to let all tasks get pulled in and then create a lookup field that can be used to filter inside a view?

Yeap pretty much.  Turning on ’Filter record selection by a condition’ in that context makes it so that you can on only select Tasks that have ‘Not Started’, ‘In Progress’ or ‘Completed’ when you’re linking new Tasks, but doesn’t actually do anything to Tasks that are already linked

Oooh, thanks for this! I’m one step closer but still not fully there. In the Team Members table I already had the Tasks linked field, so now I have created a lookup field in the Team Members table that pulls from Tasks, and set the conditions based on task status. So far when I do that I can pull in the content of a particular field from Tasks (like Task Name or Status) that have the conditions specified, but I can’t pull in a link to the actual task itself. Is there a way to use that lookup field to show on a view of a team member record only the tasks that are open in a way that then allows us to click through to the task view?

Hmm I think you’d need to create another linked field for that I’m afraid, and you’d use automations to keep them up to date.  Specifically, when a Task was marked as ‘Complete’, you’d get the automation to clear the ‘People - Open’ link

I’d also have another automation that would trigger whenever a Person is linked to a Task that would paste the same Person into the ‘People - Open’ field

You might also be able to approach this from the task side, by automating deleting the record link upon “completion”, and perhaps adding a documentation field in the tasks table that populates with “Completed by”. I could just foresee your people-tasks linked field getting super cluttered with completed tasks. 

This is a good example since your newer to Airtable, often I find some weird quirk I can’t quite solve for in the manner I’m focused on, and stepping back and trying to approach from a different angle can provide alternative methods to accomplish what you’re trying. 

That did it! I set up a completion automation that removes the assigned team member, adds the user to a completed-by field, and adds a date completed. I super appreciate everyone’s help!

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