Improvements to Automations

[Helen_Zeng]

Hey everyone! I’m Helen, the product manager that looks after our Automations product here at Airtable, and I’m really happy that you all are finally seeing the navigation changes that teams at Airtable have been hard at work on. Alongside these updates, I’m also excited to share a series of improvements that we’ve made to Automations in this new navigation that let you focus on creating and editing automations while being able to reference the data you need and make it easier to change up the steps in your automation.

Specifically, you’ll now be able to:

• See your full list of automations on the left-hand pane, similar to views in the data tab
• Open a table or view that you need to reference without leaving the automations tab
• Drag and drop actions to reorder them or move them across conditional groups
• Duplicate an action to easily reuse the logic

Huge thanks to the community for helping us improve upon this product. We’re always striving to make the product better, so as you start using this new experience so please don’t hesitate to drop any feedback you might have!

These updates will be rolled out to 100% by end of day tomorrow. If you aren’t seeing these changes reflected, please try clearing your cache.

New layout and view into data:

Drag and drop:

Duplicating actions:

[Kamille_Parks]

The preview window for table data is pretty nice. I like that it shows both the table and view you’re previewing.

[ScottWorld]

Thanks for these really great changes, @Helen_Zeng!! :grinning_face_with_big_eyes: :raised_hands: :medal_military:

One automation improvement that I’d love to see is for automations to automatically turn themselves off if somebody accidentally deletes a field that was acting as one of the triggers for that automation (or if they change the view filter for a view that triggers an automation).

This would give the opportunity for the person to undo their field deletion (or undo their view filter change) without the automation accidentally triggering for possibly thousands of records.

This has happened to at least 2 of my customers in the last few weeks, and even though they immediately “undid” the accidental field deletion, it was too late — their automations already started triggering on 15,000+ records.

[Databaser]

Welcome to the community @Helen_Zeng !

Helen_Zeng:

Specifically, you’ll now be able to:

• See your full list of automations on the left-hand pane, similar to views in the data tab
• Open a table or view that you need to reference without leaving the automations tab
• Drag and drop actions to reorder them or move them across conditional groups
• Duplicate an action to easily reuse the logic

Absolutely loving all of this :100: Great work!

Helen_Zeng:

Huge thanks to the community for helping us improve upon this product. We’re always striving to make the product better, so as you start using this new experience so please don’t hesitate to drop any feedback you might have!

:heart_eyes: :heart_eyes:

[Hannah_Wiginton]

Thank you for the update notice, @Helen_Zeng! Looks great! :star_struck:

[kuovonne]

Thank you for these product updates!

I really like how it is much easier to navigate to the automation run history.

I was a little disoriented by the list of automations moving from the right side of the screen to the left side, but once I get used to it, I think it makes sense to have the list on the left.

In addition to being able to move the actions around, I would also like to be able to move the list of fields around in the “Update record” and “Create record” actions.

[Karlstens]

@Helen_Zeng

Just a side note whilst using Automations in a trial workspace - unfortunately Automation Scripting is greyed out during an active trial.

I ask Airtable to consider this hard limitation, and at least allow a minimum of Automated scripts to be had during this trial period. Not allowing automated scripts places consultants into an awkward position of building a base that is unable to leverage Automated scripting - which is a major selling point of Airtable.

I respect that this was turned off due to the potential of being abused, but surely there’s give-and-take here, where exceptions could be allowed upon request to either Sales or Support.

[Jean_Francois_B]

Automations list side panel and floating table view are huge improvements. Thank you, @Helen_Zeng

[Jean_Francois_B]

Helen_Zeng:

Open a table or view that you need to reference without leaving the automations tab

This feature is only available on recent bases, can’t see it on my older (before 2020) bases…

[Jean_Francois_B]

Nevermind, you must click the “Open overlay” small button above the table selection…

[Rupert_Hoffsch1]

Really cool, thanks for these updates!