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Field type Request: Checkbox List

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Steven_Hambleto
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

This is a big one but I’d love to see a checkbox list field.

I can then ditch Trello!

37 Comments
Klaus_Becker
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

it’s not the same, but the multiple select field should work temporarily

Matt_Sayward
8 - Airtable Astronomer
8 - Airtable Astronomer

This already exists

Screen Shot 2017-03-23 at 10.16.34.png

Steven_Hambleto
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

Cool, can you show me a list of check boxes in a cell? It’s not working for
me…

Elishia_Hansen
4 - Data Explorer
4 - Data Explorer

I’d also like to see this. It would be really helpful to be able to create a task-lisk within a field rather then over multiple or having to create a separate base for it.

Jo_Campbell
4 - Data Explorer
4 - Data Explorer

I want to bump this feature request! This is pretty much my only remaining wishlist item/holdover from Trello. I’m envisioning a single cell that has checkboxes in a list format when expanded and when flattened it would show a count of the number of items checked, similar to the way Trello does it (e.g., 1/3, 0/5, 4/4, etc.)

I have multiple similar tasks that all have the same set of subtasks. Right now I’m using a long text field that contains a list of subtasks and I’m manually x’ing out each item when it is complete, then using the single checkbox field to mark the task completely done when all items have been x’d out. As you can imagine, this is a bit inefficient! I know ideally each subtask would be it’s own record but that’s not really conducive for these particular tasks.

  • [x] Create new folder for subject.

  • [ ] COPY all docs from previous subject into new folder for reference.

  • [ ] Collect all resources from web, etc.

Elizabeth_Carte
4 - Data Explorer
4 - Data Explorer

I also need this functionality. I am using Airtable as a personal task manager, and I need a way to show subtasks on my larger items. I am trying to use linked records right now, but there’s no way to view the completion status at a glance.

AlexWolfe
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

What about adding a ‘Project’ or similar Column for your ‘larger items’ with subtasks, then grouping your table by Project/Larger Item? If you have a linked table with Projects already you could group them by your linked table column.

This would place all subtasks below their respective Project/Larger Item, and each subtask could have a checkbox as well. You could further group these by ‘checked’ or ‘unchecked.’

Using the Airtable ‘Simple Project Tracker’ as a example (below), go to the Tasks table and select ‘Group’ to group all tasks by Project to see what I mean:

Daniel_Zuckerma
5 - Automation Enthusiast
5 - Automation Enthusiast

I echo this request - only remaining reason to use Trello, but it’s a huge one. The link to other fields works but it’s not elegant, and since task-tracking is maybe the single most common need/action this needs to be dead simple to be a good solution.

Julian_Kirkness
10 - Mercury
10 - Mercury

On the surface, this sounds a great idea - and for a very simple use-case it would be very useful. However, there are some problems with this approach to solving this problem (apart from it not adhering to the principles of database design):

  • Lets take a scenario where the checklist initially includes 3 items and has been used for a while so that many of the records have their lists completed. We now need to add a 4th item to the checklist - what would happen here is that the checklists of all previously completed records would now have outstanding items.

  • Over time, database applications tend to get more complex as needs increase and more people use them. So, whilst a simple checklist field would be great for a single user base what about when it expands? You are likely to need to be able to assign checklist tasks to other users (Collaborators) and may want to know the date it was due and completed, maybe some notes etc.

What I’m saying is that for many reasons, the @AlexWolfe suggestion above is the right way to go on this type of problem.

However, there is an issue when it comes to predefined checklists in particular in that you really need them to be automatically generated when required (for example on the creation of a new record in a table / view). It isn’t possible to do this automatically with Airtable alone - but it IS possible with Zapier / Airtable and I will be publishing an article about this later and will put a link here when it’s done.

Julian_Kirkness
10 - Mercury
10 - Mercury

OK - so I’ve now completed the blog post about how to create checklists using Zapier. If you’d like to take a look here’s the link:

Creating Checklists with Airtable and Zapier

and here’s the base:

I hope you find it useful!