Different flowchart shapes using an extra field

[Abdelrahman_Am1]

I’m consulting for a company in the capacity of process planning and process documentation. Flowcharts is one of the first tools I am using. I decided to try out Airtable in hope for future flexibility instead of using the usual Visio, lucid, StarUML, etc.

I immediately ran into

1. the problem of not being able to select different shapes for different records (Diamond=decision, rectangle=process, etc).
2. General lack of flexibility for the view because it is either all vertical or all horizontal.
3. ABC flowcharting is connecting processes using their predecessors not their successors. (it is more important to know that A needs to be done before B in order to begin B, rather than what comes after A. Well everything comes after A). I’m working around this right now, but would be nice to see the change.
   4)100 record limit.

I ordered the above in terms of importance for my case.

Thank you 🙂

P.S. I reported a bug the other day when exporting the flowchart to SVG or PNG, when I use the ‘<’ sign in one of the attributes.

[Bill_French]

Abdelrahman_Amer:

I immediately ran into

Have you looked at Vega-Lite?

[Abdelrahman_Am1]

Yes. I don’t see how flowcharts can be built using Vega-Lite though, if at all possible.

[Bill_French]

Abdelrahman_Amer:

I don’t see how flowcharts can be built using Vega-Lite though, if at all possible.

Indeed, it’s not obvious and it’s certainly not easy. Furthermore, I’ve not actually tried to use the Vega0Lite block to build a flowchart. Telling others that it may be possible is really easy though. :winking_face:

However…

If something custom (like this) is possible in Vega-Lite, a very custom flowchart is a close cousin to this example. Bear in mind that while this example is shown in the Vega editor, I don’t think it uses any grammars beyond that which is supported by Vega-Lite.

There’s no doubt that the Vega block is likely less than a coin flip probability to solve your requirements. But the chart block is zero percent probability to address the requirements.

Abdelrahman_Amer:

ABC flowcharting is connecting processes using their predecessors not their successors. (it is more important to know that A needs to be done before B in order to begin B, rather than what comes after A.

Airtable is not known for its state machine capabilities. Despite the claims as a workflow tool, there really isn’t much under the hood to address the rigors of business process automation; it all has to be built.

Abdelrahman_Amer:

100 record limit.

I’m unfamiliar with this limit. Please enlighten me.

[Karlstens]

I’ve just requested this feature with Airtable Support. The Flowchart app could be so much more, if only;

• Secondary Fields could be assigned to nest information under the primary record
• Shapes could be set by the user, perhaps with a single select field - “Square”, “Round Square”, “Diamond”
• Fields could have a parent field, which would then draw an encapsulating square around several children fields.

Such a shame that Flowchart app falls short on these features. I also highlighted to Devs how the icon itself shows two shapes being used - when in-app functionality doesn’t even allow for this…

Appreciate that everyone wanting (re:needing) improvements to this potentially powerful Flowchart App to reach out to Airtable Support for enhancements.

[Bill_French]

Karlstens:

Such a shame that Flowchart app falls short on these features.

My take -

1. Airtable never should have opened this can of worms; they’re in the information management business, not the information visualization business.
2. Airtable should have created an interface to plug other platforms into Airtable easily. They did this with Vega-Lite; they need to expand on that approach but with friendlier apps like LucidChart.
3. It’s possible to integrate things like LucidChart with the API and even script blocks.
4. Airtable should open-source apps like the Flowchart and lean on the community of developers to make it a rich and satisfying tool.

[Karlstens]

Yah, Open-sourcing Airtable Apps would go a long way, allowing users to fork it up.

I’ve just got my head around scripting and automation, will eventually make time to figure out App development, but not too sure at this stage how to even get my dev environment up and running to get the samples working - need more weekends to play with this stuff!

[Karlstens]

sigh… and I’m still waiting. :cry: