I have put together a rather large script file that does a lot of math. It seems to me that if I place a script variable value on the spreadsheet (setValues()), the whole spreadsheet recalcs (i.e.; it takes awhile to refresh). Is that true?
What if I want to format a cell from script (e.g.; change a number cell to a percentage cell with 3 places)[FormattedSS.getRange(rangecoordinates).setNumberFormat("#.###%");]? When I set the format, does the whole spreadsheet recalculate?
I am new to Google Sheets. In Excel, I could set calculation off. Google sheets does not seem to have that option.
Google sheets has no manual calculation option. You would need to create a formula to check whether to run the rest of the formula. If the output is a single cell you can easily use a circular reference to retain the value.
When it comes to Google App Scripts every time you execute a script there will be an annoying delay, that is just how it works, the App Script should be avoided at all cost in a normal spreadsheet except for when actually necessary.
Google App Script Server -> Google Sheet (delay to send information back and forth)
Google Sheet always recalculates after any change
Related
I have a Google Sheet that uses an IMPORTRANGE query to combine data from multiple other sheets. This combined import sheet is read by Google AppSheet. We have realized that the data AppSheet is reading is always outdated. It only reads the data as of the last time the sheet was manually opened.
I followed the steps in this post to try to fix this issue by creating this function: function refresh() {SpreadsheetApp.flush()}. I then set up a timed trigger to activate it once an hour. Logs show the function is running, but the data is still not updating until I manually open the sheet.
This is my first time using Apps Script. Any tips/ideas? Is there a different or better way to have the formulas update without opening the file?
Thank you for reading.
SpreadsheetApp.flush() only works for the script execution that calls it. If you need to refresh the data results from a formula it's uncertain how exactly the spreadsheet will respond as most of the formula calculations are done on the client side. You could verify this by yourself by using your web browser developer tools.
Anyway, spreadsheet formulas have several caveats so it will not be extrange that at some point you will have to rethink your solution. Assuming that you want to keep using AppSheet:
Use AppSheet for your front end and some no-code / low-code automation. Keep your app small, if you need many forms / views consider to distribute them among several apps.
Use Google Sheets only for data storage for your AppSheet app. Please bear in mind that it has 10 million cells limit for the whole spreadsheet, so you might want to delete the unused sheets and delete the unused columns and rows on each sheet.
You might use Google Apps Script to do the data import and transformation tasks. If you need that something be updated based on actions done on the AppSheet app, you might use an installable change trigger or use webhook from the AppSheet side to and a "simple" web application using Google Apps Script (you could use GET / POST http requests to trigger some Google Apps Script functions).
Also you might use other programming platforms for the data import / transformation tasks and keep using Google Sheets as your AppSheet database by using the Google Sheets API or other automation tools like Zappier, IFTTT, Integromat among many others.
solution #1
You can try this solution :
define a checkbox (for instance in A1 in tab Sheet1)
set this script
function myFunction() {
var chk = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getSheetByName('Sheet1').getRange('A1')
chk.setValue(false);
SpreadsheetApp.flush();
Utilities.sleep(500);
chk.setValue(true);
}
define a trigger on it
define the formula as follows
=if(A1,importrange("1n-rjSYb63Z2jySS3-M0BQ78vu8DTPOjG-SZM4i8IxXI","A:Z"),"")
when A1 is unchecked, the result will be empty, then check A1 to fill once again the result as expected
solution #2
by script, try for instance
function myFunction() {
var sh = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getSheetByName('Sheet9')
var data = SpreadsheetApp.openById('1n-rjSYb63Z2jySS3-M0BQ78vu8DTPOjG-SZM4i8IxXI').getSheets()[0].getDataRange().getValues()
sh.getRange(1,1,data.length,data[0].length).setValues(data)
}
put a daily triger as needed
I have a scheduled addon, which writes data periodically into a Google Sheet, without to open file. I have a formula, which should make some calculations on written data and write calculated values into the sheet, so then Data Studio with this sheet as data source updates the visualization.
What is the way to periodically run a formula calculation and write calculated values without manual steps like opening file?
I'm pretty new to this topic: my search approaches to find something like convert formula to app script or schedule formula execution brought me not to any fruitful idea.
PS_ the formula, which should do the calculation is:
=IFERROR(((VLOOKUP(A2,'[1]SV'!$A:$B,2.0))/B2)+(IF(B2=1,"33,9",IF(B2=2,"16,28",IF(B2=3,"10,36",IF(B2=4,"7",IF(B2=5,"5,64")))))+IF(B2=6,"4,13",IF(B2=7,"3,27",IF(B2=8,"2,61",IF(B2=9,"2,18",IF(B2=10,"1,82")))))+IF(B2=11,"1,77",IF(B2=12,"1,81",IF(B2=13,"1,85",IF(B2=14,"1,9",IF(B2=15,"2,04")))))+IF(B2=16,"1,68",IF(B2=17,"1,61",IF(B2=18,"1,65",IF(B2=19,"1,62",IF(B2=20,"1,59","0")))))),0)
If i would know, how to convert the formula to app script, i would manage the rest - i'm familiar with running scripts with time based trigger. Or, maybe, there is a method to run formula on the same scheduled way, like scripts...?
*Disclaimer: I have not tried this and it might not work, if it doesn't, comment and I will try to provide another solution
OK here's what i would try:
In google scripts there is a trigger function, manly used for testing. what it does is it runs your script and sends you an email if there is a error, and hypothetically, you could use this to run you script periodically.
A couple of other things I may try if this doesn't work, leave a comment if you would like me to go in depth about these:
depending on how you want this to work, you could set up a web app to do this, and instead of opining google sheets open the web app with a timer built into the script, that would trigger as long as you had the web page opened.
It might also be possible to run the script automatically with a JavaScript function, requires more research.
If Google Data Studio is not showing you the correct value then you could use a time-driven trigger to save the formula results in another cell. Example:
function respondToTimeDrivenTrigger(e){
var spreadsheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();
/** The range holding the formula */
var range = spreadsheet.getRange('Sheet1!A1');
/** The value returned by the formula */
var value = range.getValue();
/** Write the value to the cell to the right or the source cell */
range.offset(0,1).setValue(value);
}
Resources
https://developers.google.com/apps-script/guides/sheets
https://developers.google.com/apps-script/guides/triggers/installable
I am writing formulas to cells programmatically.
The following line of code:
formulaCells.setFormulaR1C1('=iferror(VLOOKUP(R[0]C[3],AutoCat!A:B,2,FALSE),"Requires Category")');
Adequately writes this formula into all the cells in the target Google Sheets file represented by formulaCells
=iferror(VLOOKUP(D2,AutoCat!A:B,2,FALSE),"Requires Category")
But the problem is that the formula defaults to the error flag "Requires Category" when it is written by Google Scripts, but if I write the very same formula manually into Google Sheets, the actual item identified by the VLOOKUP results.
This is so frustrating!
If I hover over the Google Script generated formula, the true solution from the VLOOKUP even appears in the flyover, but for some reason, does not appear in the cell.
Please help! Why will a Google Scripts generated formula not calculate properly wen the same formula entered manually will?
OK, after thinking I'd exhausted my mental resources on this, I tried one last thing, and it actually worked.
For some unknown reason, though the formula is accurate, Google Scripts generated formulas do not play well with a VLOOKUP which searches an unlimited range for a solution. So even though the VLOOKUP was finding the correct solution, it was not displaying it as the formula result.
I fixed this by creating in the Google Sheets file a named range of the data the VLOOKUP would search called AutoCategory, and then inserted that named range into the Google Scripts generated formula, and BOOM! the formula started working.
Here is the final code in Scripts:
formulaCells.setFormulaR1C1('=iferror(VLOOKUP(R[0]C[3],AutoCategory,2,FALSE),"Requires Category")');
And here is the final formula which is generated in Google Sheets:
=iferror(VLOOKUP(D2,AutoCategory,2,FALSE),"Requires Category")
setFormulaR1C1 requires R1C1 notation, which you provided with R[0]C[3], but AutoCat!A:B is A1 notation.
You could switch to setFormula() and pass in only A1 notation, but I think that using named ranges is a very good practice when combined with Google Apps Script.
I want to achieve the following:
I do not want other users of the sheet to access the formula bar for certain cells/sheets of the spreadsheet
I want to block them from accessing the script editor (do not want to show the code) used for this sheet
I do not want other users of the sheet to access the formula bar for certain cells/sheets of the spreadsheet
This is not possible.
You could publish your spreadsheet but this will not allow to edit any content, or to use Google Forms, but this will allow respondents only to submit data, not to view the result of calculations.
To securely hide the formulas they should be in another spreadsheet. You could use IMPORTRANGE or a script to import/export the calculations result. Bear in mind that IMPORTRANGE isn't recalculated immediately and that scripts could be slower than built-in functions.
An alternative is to create a web app that makes the calculations and call it from a custom function.
I want to block them from accessing the script editor (do not want to show the code) used for this sheet
It's not possible to block editors to access the Script editor. For details see
Scripts Bound to Google Sheets, Docs, or Forms. To prevent that viewers get access to the code, block the spreadsheet for making a copy. For details see Change your sharing settings
You can set permissions per cell:
- Click the cell
- Left-mouse click or Ctrl+click -> menu 'Protect range'
- Click 'Set Permissions' in sidebar
- Select Only You
Now the content is still visible.
There is a work-around for this, which is quite complicated.
- Create another sheet, called Formulas.
- Protect this sheet the same way above.
- In your main sheet you can refer to formulas in the other sheet: =Formulas!B1
- Now you can write the formula in this cell B1 in sheet Formulas
=Sheet1!B1+Sheet1!C1-Sheet1!D1 (where Sheet1 is the name of the first sheet)
- Now hide the Formulas sheet
I have some data and formulae on a Google Spreadsheet.
I want to run a new script on it which retrieves data from Google Analytics and displays it in some specific cells(mentioned in script) on the spreadsheet.
But the problem is, when I run the script, all the previous data and formulae on the spreadsheet is lost.
Is there any way by which I can keep the previous data , and at the same time run the script.??
Don't use Sheet.clear() unless you want to clear all previous content.