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Script to link every single record in one Table to all new records in another table

  • August 10, 2021
  • 5 replies
  • 77 views
M

Hello Airtable community!
I have Table 1 with over 10K records, and I want to link every single record there to Table 2 in the Linked Record Field such that everytime there’s a new record in table 2, the Linked Record Field already has all records in Table 1 linked.

I actually found a solution through the Automations app and followed this instruction: Linking existing records using automations – Airtable Support

But it seems to not link all the records. So I reached out to Airtable support and found that there’s a limit of 1000 records linked in this way.

So I am wondering if a Script can solve the 1000 records limitation, and if so, I am happy with the solution where everytime I have a new record in Table 2, it all records in Table 1 are already automatically linked, or I can take an additional action like checking a checked box as a trigger (as suggested in the Automations instructions). Thanks in advance!

    5 replies

    kuovonne
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    • kuovonne
    • Brainy
    • August 10, 2021

    Did support say that there is a limit of 1000 linked records, or that automations can handle only 1000 linked records. I suspect that it would be the former, in which case it would not matter how the link is created.

    M
    • Mei_Yi_Yeap
    • Author
    • Participating Frequently
    • August 11, 2021

    Did support say that there is a limit of 1000 linked records, or that automations can handle only 1000 linked records. I suspect that it would be the former, in which case it would not matter how the link is created.


    Sorry I should have been clearer about that. The 1000 limit is on Automations – I actually tagged 10K records to the Linked Record field using this: Linking every record of one table to a single record of another

    And I can even copy and paste by dragging down the square on the bottom right. But it is quite slow (maybe coz of the number of records). So it is rather tedious to do it manually each time, and hoping Script can solve that

    kuovonne
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    • kuovonne
    • Brainy
    • August 11, 2021

    Some initial testing looked promising. I created a base with two linked tables. I then wrote a script to create 2,000 records in one table and then link them to a single record in the other table. On the other hand, when I tried with 10,000 records, the Airtable UI crashed when I tried to expand the field with the 10,000 linked records to show all the records. All 10,000 records did seem to be linked. Also keep in mind that I did this in scripting app, and an automation script might have different results.

    On the other hand, I’m not sure you really need to do this. Usually if you need to link all the records in [Table A] to a single control record in [Table B], you can do this from the side of [Table A], where each record would have only one linked field. Plus, the performance of passing rollups back and forth for 10,000 linked records is probably abysmal, and scripting to calculate whatever you need might be faster.

    M
    • Mei_Yi_Yeap
    • Author
    • Participating Frequently
    • August 12, 2021

    Some initial testing looked promising. I created a base with two linked tables. I then wrote a script to create 2,000 records in one table and then link them to a single record in the other table. On the other hand, when I tried with 10,000 records, the Airtable UI crashed when I tried to expand the field with the 10,000 linked records to show all the records. All 10,000 records did seem to be linked. Also keep in mind that I did this in scripting app, and an automation script might have different results.

    On the other hand, I’m not sure you really need to do this. Usually if you need to link all the records in [Table A] to a single control record in [Table B], you can do this from the side of [Table A], where each record would have only one linked field. Plus, the performance of passing rollups back and forth for 10,000 linked records is probably abysmal, and scripting to calculate whatever you need might be faster.


    Thanks for going through all that testing! :pray:
    Hmm, as for scripting to do calculation - here’s what I want to do:

    Table 1: Records are Products are assigned various “Status” in step of the procurement process (i.e. Need Measurements, Listed etc). Each day, the Count of Records in each status change
    Table 2: I want to capture a snapshot everyday products in various Status as this tells me potentially what’s the issue for future analysis.
    I kinda jury-rigged that by using this method that also taps into Automations to capture snapshots of daily status: Capturing Historical Snapshots of Airtable Data - YouTube
    But ya, I have problem linking all the records.

    kuovonne
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    • kuovonne
    • Brainy
    • August 12, 2021

    Thanks for going through all that testing! :pray:
    Hmm, as for scripting to do calculation - here’s what I want to do:

    Table 1: Records are Products are assigned various “Status” in step of the procurement process (i.e. Need Measurements, Listed etc). Each day, the Count of Records in each status change
    Table 2: I want to capture a snapshot everyday products in various Status as this tells me potentially what’s the issue for future analysis.
    I kinda jury-rigged that by using this method that also taps into Automations to capture snapshots of daily status: Capturing Historical Snapshots of Airtable Data - YouTube
    But ya, I have problem linking all the records.


    If you need a script in the workflow, why not have a script do all of the work of populating the table of historical data without relying on linked record fields at all? Having thousands of linked records and the associated rollups could unnecessarily slow down your base.

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