Formula for if blank/if not blank

[Emily_Gonzales]

This closed topic answered my question about accurate time stamps for imported records but i can’t figure out the formula… what is the operator for “not blank”. This is all very new to me and i am learning as i go…

IF({Original Time Stamp}=BLANK(),"{Time Stamp}",IF{Original Time Stamp}=ISNOTBLANK, {Original Time Stamp})

https://community.airtable.com/t/created-date-time-field-and-imported-data/30941

[Justin_Barrett]

Welcome to the community, @Emily_Gonzales ! :grinning_face_with_big_eyes:

To check if a field contains anything—i.e. it’s not blank—use this syntax:

IF({Field Name}, ...

To check if a field is empty, wrap the field name in NOT():

IF(NOT({Field Name}), ...

In your case, the formula would become:

IF(NOT({Original Time Stamp}),"{Time Stamp}",IF({Original Time Stamp}, {Original Time Stamp}))

However, this could be greatly simplified:

IF({Original Time Stamp}, {Original Time Stamp}, "{Time Stamp}")

By checking for a non-blank field first, we can use the value found if it’s there, and fall back on “{Time Stamp}” if not.

[Emily_Gonzales]

THANK YOU so much!! this is immensely helpful. Now i have the problem of formatting. I am getting a combination of results that look like this: 2020-06-10T23:43:05.000Z AND this 4/6/2020 5:32pm. I would prefer the latter…

[Justin_Barrett · Accepted solution]

The former is an unformatted date. The latter is formatted. Not sure how you’re seeing both in the same field, but assuming that {Original Time Stamp} is a date, then your formula should become this:

IF({Original Time Stamp}, DATETIME_FORMAT({Original Time Stamp}, "l"), "{Time Stamp}")

A full list of date formatting options can be found here:

Airtable - Support

Supported format specifiers for DATETIME_FORMAT

The DATETIME_FORMAT function will allow you to reformat the data from the date-type field into a string of your specifications. This is written in the form "DATETIME_FORMAT(Datetime, 'format s...