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Attachment URLS

  • February 14, 2023
  • 9 replies
  • 234 views

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I know I am late to the game here. I have been ignoring the updates until now. I currently have uploads and the links for the uploads through a formula - which allows me to create a download button.

I use these so in the public share link to my base - users can quickly select the download button instead of opening the record and downloading the actual file.

 

The airtable documentation says the url will stop working when in formulas. This sounds like my use case scenario. Does anyone know if this will this continue to work going forward?

Obviously I thought this was meant to stop working in November, so either they haven't got to my base yet or I am in the clear (because it still works)...

If this function will stop working - is there an alternative way to achieve what I am doing when the change happens?

Best answer by kuovonne

Did you choose to temporarily opt out of expiring urls? If so, the opt out period only just ended, and it may take some time for the rollout of the changes and for the urls to actually expire, as well for cached versions of the attachments to expire.

You can host the images on a different service that is designed to be a CDN and then direct your button to those second images. However, you would then need a system to maintain images in both places and keep them in sync.

9 replies

kuovonne
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  • Brainy
  • Answer
  • February 14, 2023

Did you choose to temporarily opt out of expiring urls? If so, the opt out period only just ended, and it may take some time for the rollout of the changes and for the urls to actually expire, as well for cached versions of the attachments to expire.

You can host the images on a different service that is designed to be a CDN and then direct your button to those second images. However, you would then need a system to maintain images in both places and keep them in sync.


Forum|alt.badge.img+8
  • Author
  • Known Participant
  • February 14, 2023

Did you choose to temporarily opt out of expiring urls? If so, the opt out period only just ended, and it may take some time for the rollout of the changes and for the urls to actually expire, as well for cached versions of the attachments to expire.

You can host the images on a different service that is designed to be a CDN and then direct your button to those second images. However, you would then need a system to maintain images in both places and keep them in sync.


Okay yes you are probably right re the opt out. Okay. Thats an idea, I might look at something that when a new upload is added to airtable, it uploads somewhere else and feeds a link back... Thanks for your help


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  • Known Participant
  • May 24, 2023

Did you choose to temporarily opt out of expiring urls? If so, the opt out period only just ended, and it may take some time for the rollout of the changes and for the urls to actually expire, as well for cached versions of the attachments to expire.

You can host the images on a different service that is designed to be a CDN and then direct your button to those second images. However, you would then need a system to maintain images in both places and keep them in sync.


Is there some tutorial for doing this? I'm going crazy tying to figure out a simple solution to this.  I have a lot of emails that pull images from Airtable before going out, and now they are all not working. Can you direct me to some tutorials or solutions? Thanks!


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  • Author
  • Known Participant
  • May 24, 2023

Is there some tutorial for doing this? I'm going crazy tying to figure out a simple solution to this.  I have a lot of emails that pull images from Airtable before going out, and now they are all not working. Can you direct me to some tutorials or solutions? Thanks!


I now have an automation in make.com which uploads the image to Dropbox (as soon as it’s added to airtable) and then feeds a share link back to airtable - so I am able to fetch the image or attach it to emails etc. outside of airtable.


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  • Known Participant
  • May 24, 2023

I now have an automation in make.com which uploads the image to Dropbox (as soon as it’s added to airtable) and then feeds a share link back to airtable - so I am able to fetch the image or attach it to emails etc. outside of airtable.


are you willing to show your automation in make.com so I can base mine on how it works?


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  • Author
  • Known Participant
  • May 24, 2023

See pictures - let me know if you have any questions - this is how I do it. I have a webhook which sends the record ID.

(I add a 'sleep' for a few seconds - just in case I have a big file - to give it enough time to upload before trying to fetch the share link.)


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  • Participating Frequently
  • November 19, 2023

Hello. An alternative solution to this issue is dependent on using a third-party application that integrates with Airtable. miniExtensions provides an extension specifically designed for this scenario:

https://miniextensions.com/airtable-attachments-to-urls/.

This extension creates non-expiring URLs for your Airtable attachments.


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  • Participating Frequently
  • January 2, 2024

Hello. An alternative solution to this issue is dependent on using a third-party application that integrates with Airtable. miniExtensions provides an extension specifically designed for this scenario:

https://miniextensions.com/airtable-attachments-to-urls/.

This extension creates non-expiring URLs for your Airtable attachments.


i use this extension already for my other base... do you happen to know how to pass multiple images in one attachment field?


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  • New Participant
  • April 30, 2024

i use this extension already for my other base... do you happen to know how to pass multiple images in one attachment field?


I'm the maker of https://aircdn.io which supports multiple images in one attachment field.

Air CDN gives you a formula that gives you static URLs for image attachments, similar to the miniextension's attachment tool. Unlike miniextensions, Air CDN supports multiple images per record and multiple images per column.

Let me know if you need help setting up!