There’s one more terrible hack using Zapier and base APIs, but man does it suck. The thing that is absolutely insane is how little attention Airtable seems to be giving to this, their greatest, and perhaps only, flaw, holding it back from being the undisputed greatest piece of software ever created by humans.
I would love to have multiple bases but 1 calendar that I can see everything going on. Basically have a base for biz and a base for personal, but 1 calendar that shows all so I do not need to go to separate places or another tool completely.
Linking bases, even if only in read-only state - is an obvious design function that should be there already. For an app costing $20/mo per user especially. At least an explanation from the folks at AT as to why the feature is not there.
Watching again - you did pretty much hit the pain points with this vid. 2022 now and Airtable STILL don't seem to have done anything to resolve this functionality
@@GarethPronovost I've jumped into Airtable with a client as a stopgap measure while we define data and processes + make decisions on a formal system.. I had high hopes for sync'd tables as a way of segregating 3rd-party database access, but it seems that there's no option/function to link imported records to matching entries in the host base. I know the records all have UID's and aren't actually governed by their 'key' field, but it seemed logical that there should be some kind of reconciliation (option).. I mean syncing doesn't seem to mean anything if you can't then work with the data in a cohesive fashion. Specific example: - I wanted to manage inventory with a 3rd party manufacturer, who warehouses OUR stock for THEIR manufacturing processes. - They get a separate base because this allows data access management. - I wanted to share an inventory table with that base, so they get visibility of master stock records. - Their base has native inwards and outwards goods tables (ie. classic AT template). - Picking components (for ledger entries) on those two sheets should be easy/accurate via linked field to the sync'd inventory table this doesn't work* - Their base would share in and out tables as sync's, back to the master base. The master base inventory table would have rollups that count in's vs out's and get a stock volume (ie. classic AT template). this also doesn't work* *because sync'd data records contain only text strings, not record identifiers. Did I miss something? Is there a known workaround?
@@yachalupson no, you haven't missed anything. You can include buttons to open the "source" record in the parent base/table, but that's probably insufficient for your needs here. Sorry I don't have better news.
@@GarethPronovost Such is life huh. Thanks for the reply! Happy new year to you and I hope business is well; great content here from the last couple of years.
There's a more advanced sync automation that you can do now that wasn't possible before. Every time a record is updated, you can push the changes to another base. Alternatively, Airtable also released a new feature called tableSync that works in a lot of cases!
Gary, I really appreciated this style of Strategy Planning' video tutorial and I'd like to see more of them. I also liked how you gave a clear explanation of terms first. I often have a lot of easy to answer questions and I will google them and search through chat rooms (usually) for answers. However, Airtable and Many Chat for example (even Zapier) are not optimized for finding answers to these types of questions. It takes a lot of searching to find answers/solutions. Often times I have to watch an 8-40 minute video hoping to learn an answer. I'd love to see you make a series of very specific answers to very specific questions. If you do that you'll see a lot more traffic/views I bet. You're likely to make Google's answer box, which in addition to speeding up the ask/answer process is as you know is the future of search results and very beneficial to your video series/marketing efforts.
I agree with Steven. Some of the things that you do in Airtable are very specific, and sometimes they are not easy to know that it can even do it. For example, I wanted to add the days of the week, (Monday, Tuesday, etc ) but did not see that as an option, just the date which does not show days of the week. So I googled, ‘how to add week day airtable’ and a lot of the results were about dates, not days. I eventually had to tweak my research to add Monday and week day, to find out there is a formula that can be used , to bring in mo, or mon, or Monday for Monday. I feel like that took too long, to search, refine my search , scroll thru forums, trial and error with limited (not specific) information learned. A tutorial you could have made titled ‘adding days of the week’ or ‘how to add week days along with dates’ (Monday January 31,2019) would probably be the first result, since I also always prefer to watch a video. On a side note, just started using airtable, love it, glad I found your channel, thanks for all the information you are providing. Really helpful.
Is The Problem Really That Base can't Interact with each other or that you cannot hide information from certain people within one base? I Have overcome the issue on my bases in a similar way you explained though. Again nice video
Awesome point! That would address the same problem from a different angle. If we could limit a user's access to data (instead of just on/off for the whole base), that would be amazing!
Thanks for this. I'd really like it if Airtable do introduce a feature that allows linking between bases but they seem strangely reluctant to do that. Haven't used zapier much yet, but looks like it could be a workable solution. If you had a primary base under a "Pro" account (or other paid account) I wonder if you could zap that into a workspace on a free account, thereby giving full access to others without them having to have pro accounts too.
Hey Jonathan - you sure can! If you 'zap' data to a base in a free workspace, you can share that base without incurring costs. The bigger trouble really centers around how you will update that data in your paid account (presumably, the people you share with will be making changes to the data and that won't be reflected in your primary records).
I’m just thinking out loud here but I think he’s saying there are 3 bases. One with the private information. One with the common information, and a third which collects both but only the owner has access to. This third one is used for viewing only, setting up views, maybe automated stuff with blocks, or custom pages. This way there is never a situation where the third base needs to sync back to the other two. I guess this assumed that the first base does not need any of the tables from the second base. Or vice versa
Dear Gareth, I tried to get the app for mac but it doesn't work. How can I get a shortcut to use the platform directly from my macbook or desktop screensaver? For the moment I have to enter airtable through a link on my email, which is not practical and a waste of time. Thank you for your help.
Hey LM - I don't personally use a mac, so I'm not familiar with that. However, many of my team members are mac users and they are able to work in Airtable without this issue. For me, if I'm using the app on my desktop, it works just fine. Additionally, I often use Airtable directly in my web browser. For this, I just open a new tab, go to airtable.com and then find the base I want to access. Hope this helps!
Dear Sir, is there a point in leaving google sheets ? is there any improvement 2 years after for me and my employees ? (because add-ons is really not my things), Would you advise us to migrate to Notion ? because airtable offers no confidentiality as if the world operates like that, how can they miss that ?!!! Don't they understand business ?!!!
Hi! Are you asking if you can link data across different bases? If so, then Airtable has now released a SYNC feature that allows some cross-base data, but it's not a true integration. Personally, I wouldn't advise Notion as an option because it lacks the depth of support for complex data structures, but that's my personal preference and opinion. I'm not sure why you think Airtable offers no confidentiality...?
@@GarethPronovost It means the database can communicate through an SQL service(to standards). It's an interface for communications using the SQL language.
Today I asked Airtable Team “I wonder: Do your team share all your salary information with each other or do you use another software to manage because Airtable is not sophisticated enough” I will wait until they reply.
@@GarethPronovost This is the reply: "Thanks for sharing your feedback on collaborator permissions and it's current limitations for your use case. I've gone ahead and shared this with our Product team for further review." Should I go Shawshank Redemption on this.
@@GarethPronovost Thank you for the response Gareth. To use this LOOKUP field type i need a link type to get the info from. Do i need to manually put each link on the link column or can i drag like in excel?
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There’s one more terrible hack using Zapier and base APIs, but man does it suck. The thing that is absolutely insane is how little attention Airtable seems to be giving to this, their greatest, and perhaps only, flaw, holding it back from being the undisputed greatest piece of software ever created by humans.
TLDW
4:51 Option 1 - Use shared views
6:12 Option 2 - Zap data between two bases
I would love to have multiple bases but 1 calendar that I can see everything going on. Basically have a base for biz and a base for personal, but 1 calendar that shows all so I do not need to go to separate places or another tool completely.
Linking bases, even if only in read-only state - is an obvious design
function that should be there already. For an app costing $20/mo per
user especially. At least an explanation from the folks at AT as to why
the feature is not there.
Hey Great White - check out the new updates from today - one-way linking across bases is the newest feature!
A very clear tutorial to increase my level of understanding on airtable, thank you.
that makes sense like a main and branch repository
Running into this problem now. Considering creating a second base just for invoicing
I'm running into this problem right now! ha... let's talk about this
Watching again - you did pretty much hit the pain points with this vid. 2022 now and Airtable STILL don't seem to have done anything to resolve this functionality
Maybe not completely solved, but the synced bases sure help a lot. Inching closer! 🤞
@@GarethPronovost I've jumped into Airtable with a client as a stopgap measure while we define data and processes + make decisions on a formal system.. I had high hopes for sync'd tables as a way of segregating 3rd-party database access, but it seems that there's no option/function to link imported records to matching entries in the host base.
I know the records all have UID's and aren't actually governed by their 'key' field, but it seemed logical that there should be some kind of reconciliation (option).. I mean syncing doesn't seem to mean anything if you can't then work with the data in a cohesive fashion.
Specific example:
- I wanted to manage inventory with a 3rd party manufacturer, who warehouses OUR stock for THEIR manufacturing processes.
- They get a separate base because this allows data access management.
- I wanted to share an inventory table with that base, so they get visibility of master stock records.
- Their base has native inwards and outwards goods tables (ie. classic AT template).
- Picking components (for ledger entries) on those two sheets should be easy/accurate via linked field to the sync'd inventory table
this doesn't work*
- Their base would share in and out tables as sync's, back to the master base. The master base inventory table would have rollups that count in's vs out's and get a stock volume
(ie. classic AT template).
this also doesn't work*
*because sync'd data records contain only text strings, not record identifiers.
Did I miss something? Is there a known workaround?
@@yachalupson no, you haven't missed anything. You can include buttons to open the "source" record in the parent base/table, but that's probably insufficient for your needs here. Sorry I don't have better news.
@@GarethPronovost Such is life huh. Thanks for the reply! Happy new year to you and I hope business is well; great content here from the last couple of years.
Can we use Automation‘s in Airtable to run a script to update the mirror base?
There's a more advanced sync automation that you can do now that wasn't possible before. Every time a record is updated, you can push the changes to another base.
Alternatively, Airtable also released a new feature called tableSync that works in a lot of cases!
Gary, I really appreciated this style of Strategy Planning' video tutorial and I'd like to see more of them. I also liked how you gave a clear explanation of terms first. I often have a lot of easy to answer questions and I will google them and search through chat rooms (usually) for answers. However, Airtable and Many Chat for example (even Zapier) are not optimized for finding answers to these types of questions. It takes a lot of searching to find answers/solutions. Often times I have to watch an 8-40 minute video hoping to learn an answer. I'd love to see you make a series of very specific answers to very specific questions. If you do that you'll see a lot more traffic/views I bet. You're likely to make Google's answer box, which in addition to speeding up the ask/answer process is as you know is the future of search results and very beneficial to your video series/marketing efforts.
Thanks for that recommendation, Steven! I'll definitely give that some attention for future content!
I agree with Steven. Some of the things that you do in Airtable are very specific, and sometimes they are not easy to know that it can even do it. For example, I wanted to add the days of the week, (Monday, Tuesday, etc ) but did not see that as an option, just the date which does not show days of the week. So I googled, ‘how to add week day airtable’ and a lot of the results were about dates, not days. I eventually had to tweak my research to add Monday and week day, to find out there is a formula that can be used , to bring in mo, or mon, or Monday for Monday. I feel like that took too long, to search, refine my search , scroll thru forums, trial and error with limited (not specific) information learned. A tutorial you could have made titled ‘adding days of the week’ or ‘how to add week days along with dates’ (Monday January 31,2019) would probably be the first result, since I also always prefer to watch a video. On a side note, just started using airtable, love it, glad I found your channel, thanks for all the information you are providing. Really helpful.
Please try coda and make a video on Coda vs Airtable
Hey Ayush - we'll add it to the long list of videos to research!
Is The Problem Really That Base can't Interact with each other or that you cannot hide information from certain people within one base? I Have overcome the issue on my bases in a similar way you explained though. Again nice video
Awesome point! That would address the same problem from a different angle. If we could limit a user's access to data (instead of just on/off for the whole base), that would be amazing!
How did you overcome it Roxanne?
Thanks for this. I'd really like it if Airtable do introduce a feature that allows linking between bases but they seem strangely reluctant to do that. Haven't used zapier much yet, but looks like it could be a workable solution.
If you had a primary base under a "Pro" account (or other paid account) I wonder if you could zap that into a workspace on a free account, thereby giving full access to others without them having to have pro accounts too.
Hey Jonathan - you sure can! If you 'zap' data to a base in a free workspace, you can share that base without incurring costs. The bigger trouble really centers around how you will update that data in your paid account (presumably, the people you share with will be making changes to the data and that won't be reflected in your primary records).
u create automations with zappier ;) .... u give access to dedicated table to collaborator and u consolidate into one with zappier
Exactly - if only they could actually be 'linked' though!
I’m just thinking out loud here but I think he’s saying there are 3 bases. One with the private information. One with the common information, and a third which collects both but only the owner has access to. This third one is used for viewing only, setting up views, maybe automated stuff with blocks, or custom pages. This way there is never a situation where the third base needs to sync back to the other two. I guess this assumed that the first base does not need any of the tables from the second base. Or vice versa
All it really needs is better permissions on views. The ability to give edit access to a specific view would solve so many problems.
100% agreed - in fact I just did a new video this week on this very topic! th-cam.com/video/ZBN1SLbWvek/w-d-xo.html
Dear Gareth, I tried to get the app for mac but it doesn't work. How can I get a shortcut to use the platform directly from my macbook or desktop screensaver? For the moment I have to enter airtable through a link on my email, which is not practical and a waste of time. Thank you for your help.
Hey LM - I don't personally use a mac, so I'm not familiar with that. However, many of my team members are mac users and they are able to work in Airtable without this issue.
For me, if I'm using the app on my desktop, it works just fine. Additionally, I often use Airtable directly in my web browser. For this, I just open a new tab, go to airtable.com and then find the base I want to access.
Hope this helps!
The answer offered is to copy the data between bases using a zap.
Good shit man!
Dear Sir, is there a point in leaving google sheets ? is there any improvement 2 years after for me and my employees ? (because add-ons is really not my things), Would you advise us to migrate to Notion ? because airtable offers no confidentiality as if the world operates like that, how can they miss that ?!!! Don't they understand business ?!!!
Hi! Are you asking if you can link data across different bases? If so, then Airtable has now released a SYNC feature that allows some cross-base data, but it's not a true integration. Personally, I wouldn't advise Notion as an option because it lacks the depth of support for complex data structures, but that's my personal preference and opinion. I'm not sure why you think Airtable offers no confidentiality...?
Have a look at Knack.
Not having the ability to link bases is a huge limitation to Airtable. Is Airtable bases SQL compliant?
Hey Dennis - I'm not sure. What does it mean to be SQL compliant?
@@GarethPronovost It means the database can communicate through an SQL service(to standards). It's an interface for communications using the SQL language.
@@dennistucker1153 right on - this isn't something I've ever done so I can't talk to it... sorry!
any tutorial on airtable integration with zapier?
I think this one is what you're looking for:
th-cam.com/video/x-k-T2cnd5g/w-d-xo.html
Today I asked Airtable Team “I wonder: Do your team share all your salary information with each other or do you use another software to manage because Airtable is not sophisticated enough”
I will wait until they reply.
Let me know what they say ;)
@@GarethPronovost This is the reply: "Thanks for sharing your feedback on collaborator permissions and it's current limitations for your use case. I've gone ahead and shared this with our Product team for further review."
Should I go Shawshank Redemption on this.
@@GarethPronovost 9/14/20: "Yeees~" haha
Hello Gareth, i want to know if for example: I calculate a value in "Table 2" and i want that value in a column of "Table 1". Is this possible?
Hey Felix - totally possible. Check out the 'LOOKUP' field type. It allows you to bring a field from another linked table.
@@GarethPronovost Thank you for the response Gareth. To use this LOOKUP field type i need a link type to get the info from. Do i need to manually put each link on the link column or can i drag like in excel?