I have a Google Spreadsheet like this with a chart and a dropdown menu. I would like the data range of that chart to update based on a value selected from a dropdown menu.
I thought I might be able to add a Google App Script to the dropdown menu, but I can't find a way to add such script to anything but a drawing. Can someone tell me how to achieve this? Or point me into the right direction (Doc link?) as I'm new to both Google Spreadsheets and App Scripts.
Update:
From the comments it seems using App Scripts onEdit trigger might work.
The idea would be
to trigger onEdit when the value from the dropdown cell changes
fetch the cell value to use as an argument for another function
that in turn alters the data range of a chart.
As far as I can see onEdit triggers with changes made to any cell. Is there a way to limit this trigger to specific cells/ranges?
If I were you, I would use your drop-down menu as reference in a Query(). Often, I'll use a Query() in a hidden section of columns on my sheet, and use that hidden section as the data range for my charts. For example, if your drop down was in A1 you could have in B1 a Query() that uses a cell reference to find your data, and then hide columns B through however many you need to display your data. Then you make your data range B1:D (or whatever the range actually ended up being). Your example sheet has been moved to your trash, but if you share a data set with me, I could show you a pertinent example. Here is a less than pertinent example Ta-Da. I know that it is probably too general to use for your specific case, but perhaps if we knew more we could point you to a more specific work-around.
Related
I'm using Google Apps Script to make a function that will be called in a Google Sheet. The function does some auto calculating for a spell effect. Some spells need the player to provide extra info (How many people are you shielding, etc) and some don't need any additional inputs. If extra info is needed, the user provides it in the cell directly above the cell that calls the function. I'll call this the "input cell" for clarity. The "function cell" is the one that calls the function, directly below the input cell.
My question is this: if the extra info is unneeded, as determined by conditionals within the function, how do I overwrite the contents of the input cell with '-'? I can't put a formula within that cell directly, because the user would overwrite the formula when entering the additional information. The function also returns a value to the cell that called it.
I've tried a bunch of techniques but I can't figure out how to do it.
I tried returning an array of both values, but it flows downwards instead
of upwards, and I couldn't find anything for "return array offset
upwards" or something to that effect.
I can't use absolute references
like "L17" because the function can be called from many places on the
sheet, and it also only needs to mess with the cell directly above it.
using setValue() or setValues() threw a "no permission" error.
I would attach my code, but it's a mess of half-deleted attempts that didn't work, and wouldn't be much help at all. I also don't want to ask anything too specific, for fear of running into the https://xyproblem.info problem. I just want to be able to have a function edit the cell directly above it, and I don't care about which technique gets that accomplished.
Any help is greatly appreciated. Thank you!
No cell can contain both a formula(or a output of a formula) and simultaneously contain a user entered value. That was always the case with any spreadsheet, Excel or Google sheets or any other. It's one or the other. Choose one and redraw your logic!
For your specific problem, if you can reflow your logic, you might try simple triggers like onEdit.
How to Get the currently selected cell/range? was asked 3.5 years ago, but I'm hoping maybe some progress was made since then.
I'd like to make an interactive spreadsheet where there's a boolean grid that will display more information about the status of the currently selected cell in a static location, allowing users to quickly navigate using the arrow keys.
Referencing the previous instance of this question, I tried using the custom function below to get the cell address, although this isn't very dynamic.
function currentCell() {
return SpreadsheetApp.getActive().getActiveRange().getA1Notation();
}
When testing, this function returns the address of the cell the function is called from. I've tried pressing F5 while highlighting another cell and nothing happened. I've also dragged the formula across a selection and each cell only contains its own address (according to the documentation, it should contain the range).
I've also read Henrique's post on caching from 2012, and while I don't completely understand it, I get that we could not get scripts which update without edits being made or manual formula updates.
I would ideally like for the current cell to be tracked without any extra prompts from the user besides arrow key navigation or clicking to select a cell, but if pressing a non-altering key (like Enter) would allow for tracking, that would be fine. I also only need the selected cell, rather than a range, if that makes things easier.
Explicit Question: Is it possible to track the position of the currently selected cell in Google Sheets and store that position in a separate cell? If not, is there a way to do this without altering cell values?
EDIT: Adding an example for clarity. In this conceptual example, A2 =currentCell() as described above. If I were to hit the right arrow key, A2 would update to display I4, since it is now the current selection.
EDIT2: Jason Allshorn's response to Google app script monitor spreadsheet selected ranges appears to give a way of displaying the current selection (range) on the HTML input text. I'd like to do this, but store the value in a static cell on the sheet rather than input text. I'm new to scripting in Sheets and really only know what I've found for resolving this issue, so if I'm overlooking something, please let me know. I did look at Jason's example sheet and it wasn't clear to me what was actually happening there.
You will have to apply the technique suggested on How do I make a Sidebar display values from cells?. This consist on using using client-side code to constantly pulling values from the spreadsheet and then do the corresponding task.
One approach is to use a side-panel with an input field to set the cells to be tracked and another input field to set the destination cell.
You will have to use the onSelectionChange event in the app script to capture any selection change and then get the range name and put it in desired cell.
Something like the below:
function onSelectionChange(e) {
const range = e.range;
//Return in case of multi cell selection
if(range.getNumRows() !== 1 || range.getNumColumns() !== 1) return;
SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getActiveSheet().getRange("A2").setValue(range.getA1Notation());
}
You can see the official documentation here
I have a script for Google Sheets I am working on. I realize there are better ways to do what I am attempting (cough html/database cough), but I am required to make this spreadsheet work.
In short, I am trying to hide and unhide rows dynamically. There does not appear to be a way to get filters to update without redoing them, so I am attempting to use hideRows to hide them and unhideRows to reveal them as needed.
The hideRows command works below. The unhideRows command does not. At this time, they are literally this close together in the code. Originally, I was hiding on one sheet and unhiding on another, but set up like this to troubleshoot. There is no filtering on this sheet (because it didn't work, I turned it off). I tried setting the value in unhideRows directly to the value tested instead of a variable.
The row in question hides, but does not unhide.
I tried unhiding a different row just in case google was fumbling with hide this, unhide it back to back. I am not getting unhide to work.
{ //thisRow = the row number of a range, in this case 2 if output to screen
pImages.hideRows(thisRow);
pImages.unhideRows(thisRow);
}
Apparently, the answer is not to unhideRows() which is the one the documents alluded to, but showRows () which does make more sense in everyday language. Thanks again to Mr.Houdini on the Google forums.
I have a Google Sheet that I'm using as a timesheet. I'd like to use the sidebar to report contents of cells. In addition to the main timesheet, I have a sheet that is dedicated to keeping track of total hours and overtime.
I'm looking for a way to display cell values from my tracking sheet in the sidebar, and have it update values every time the spreadsheet is edited.
Despite looking for several days, I either can't find, or can't grasp how it's done.
Thank you in advance for your time.
Create an onEdit() simple trigger function that runs every time a cell is edited. The sidebar will probably need to be re-displayed every time there is an edit that you want updated in the sidebar. I don't know of anyway to pass data to the sidebar without re-displaying it. I hope I'm wrong. I haven't researched it, but I can't think how that would be done. You could update the spreadsheet from the sidebar with no problem. But I don't know how you'd update the sidebar from the spreadsheet without re-displaying the sidebar.
I have a dynamically generated spreadsheet. I would like to be able to allow the viewer to go to a different sheet/cell when a cell is clicked on. I'm having trouble figuring out a good way to do this.
Going to the new cell is fairly easy: Spreadhseet.setActiveSheet()/Spreadsheet.setActiveRange() work fine. My thought was to encode the link destination in the contents of the source cell, and then write a script to "follow" the link.
I tried using images or drawings. But there were two problems with this: while images can be inserted programmatically, I did not see a way to programmatically associate a script with them. And the called script does not have an associated event tied to it, so there is no way to see what cell the user clicked (clicking an image does not set the active cell).
I thought about using onEdit(). This almost works, but onEdit is only triggered on changes (not selection) so the user actually has to modify the cell in order to "link". When testing I tended to zap the contents of the cell by accident with onEdit.
I tried making a menu item, and in the menu's script get the active cell's contents to determine where to go to. This worked but was a bit more difficult for the user than I was hoping for.
I was hoping someone would have a creative solution to this problem.
Thanks!
From what you are describing the drawing or image insertion should work since it has exactly the same functionality as the menu item. You can assign a script to it just like in a menu.