Using Airtable for custom reporting and access control
I just wanted to show (perhaps showoff :winking_face: ) one of our latest projects with Airtable. Using multiple Airtable tables our marketing client manages their projects, clients and incoming reports. They require their contractors to upload reports which we are using an AT form (soon to be custom form as client needs extra requirements) to input the data.
Each of the customers are using a generated token based on the AT record ID which is part of their link to access the site ie. mysite.com/wo55eiruWERsdhf234 as security isn’t a primary objective they just don’t want “browsers” being able to have public access.
These links can be sent out using the Airtable email block, these links are easily regenerated in AT and deactivated using a checkbox as well. Each client gets their unique link and once they connect can only see the projects they are assigned to in Airtable on a custom home page.
The site provides an nice view of the data in chronological order and images retrieved from Airtable as well.
We allow them to have multiple custom printing options with branded or unbranded PDFs that the clients can download and share via email.
All the data is retrieved live from Airtable via their API which is super quick! Sorry I have to block out some of the data in the images but essentially this enables a really good data logging experience from the business side and and easy to read presentation of that data on the client side, all keeping it semi-secure away from any accidental public access. But also making the site shareable with out any username/password mess.
If anyone is interested in custom integrations for Airtable we’re happy to discuss and help out.
Kris
Chief Monkey @ Shoosh Monkey PTY LTD
kris@shooshmonkey.com
Canberra, Australia
an update on this integration/installation. The client wanted a more elaborate form that was dynamic so we built him a custom purpose form to feed the airtable base with.
Their agents needed to add data to a specific region that had multiple facets with different information, in other words not just a simple straight forward form.
So the below is what we came up with, the form uses the same secure link as the reports website so logging in is a piece of cake.
The can add the master information and also add the extra form information by adding/removing sections of the form. So adding a master region then each region can have separate sub regions with information.
This data is recallable when the form needs to be edited, most of the fields read of data from the AT base from different tables such as projects for them to choose from and only the person submitting it can see the forms they have created. All of these form submissions feed into a table which can be linked into the other tables for dynamic information.
