Automation for updating columns between two spreadsheets

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KFC1985 Author

Level 1

5 points

Automation for updating columns between two spreadsheets

If possible, I need to find an automation that will update info from one spreadsheet to another.

Here is the situation: we run an online radio station, and monthly, we must submit the listening reports for royalties to the license holders. I have a separate spreadsheet with all the data needed to submit because the one given by the radio station doesn't have all the data required for submission, just the number of plays. So I have to manually go down 100+ rows and enter in the number of plays; it would be nice if there were automation to update each row if possible.

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 15.0

Posted on Nov 1, 2024 9:48 AM

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Answer 1

Camelot

Level 9

55,299 points

Nov 1, 2024 11:10 AM in response to KFC1985

This sounds entirely doable, but there are so many gotchas it's impossible to give a single-line answer.

The issue is that we can't see either your source data, nor the intended/desired output, so there's no way to know how any automation is expected to compile the data.

For example, it sounds like the results table has 100 rows, and you have to enter values in those rows corresponding to the playlists, but it isn't clear where that data comes from.

It's also not clear what format the data is in. At first glance it sounds like a pivot table would be a good start since this can automatically categorize and summarize data but, again, that depends on the format you're working with.

I'm happy to take a run at this, but I'd need more information to be able to do anything.

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Answer 2

SGIII

Level 8

36,122 points

Nov 2, 2024 6:07 AM in response to KFC1985

KFC1985 wrote:

from one spreadsheet to another.

In Numbers nomenclature "spreadsheet" means a document.

Do you mean you have your data in separate Numbers documents, or in separate tables in the same document>

If you mean separate documents then be aware that formulas in Numbers cannot reference another document.

So if you want to automate that you will need to use a script, which is doable, but can get clunky.

In either case, lots more details are needed on the structure of your Numbers documents before a solution can be proposed.

SG

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