Grid Essentials

Get familiar with Grid View's powerful data management and usability features.

Jon Darbyshire avatar
Written by Jon Darbyshire
Updated over a week ago

Grid View is built to provide the same usability as your trusty spreadsheet, while unlocking powerful features to make visualizing data easier. Our goal is to help ease data analysis to make better business decisions.


Hiding & Reordering Fields

Fields in a record appear as columns in Grid View. Use the Column Control to Collapse the column or Remove from Display entirely.

Note πŸ“ : Collapsed columns can be expanded with a simple click in Grid View. Fields removed from display will need to be re-added in the Fields to Display control.

Reorder fields in Grid View using drag & drop. Just grab the column and move it into a new position.


Freezing Grid Columns

The first column, primary field, in Grid View is frozen by default. Hovering over the line between the first and second columns allows you to drag & drop the columns that are frozen.

The number of columns you can freeze depends on the width of your screen - as a rule, you can freeze up to 60% of your screen.

This is useful for "locking" key data into place on the left side of the grid while scrolling to the right. It's handy for when you have a lot of fields you want to display as columns. At SmartSuite, we use it often for making updates to large data sets where having reference info on the left is handy πŸ‘πŸΌ.


Expanding Cells

Clicking into text fields or fields with multiple values "activates" the cell and provides an option in the upper-right of the cell to Expand.

Field types that can be expanded include:

  • TextArea

  • SmartDoc

  • Checklist

  • Tag

  • Linked Record

  • Sub-Items

  • Assign To

  • Color Picker

  • Files and Images

  • Link

  • IP Address, Phone, Address, Email Address (when set to allow multiple values)

Click to Expand, for example:


Adjusting Column Widths

Hover over the right side of the column header, which highlights the column edge. Grab it and drag left or right to change the column width - just like in a spreadsheet.


Copy & Paste

Grid View supports copy & pasting values between cells just like in a traditional spreadsheet.

Use the keyboard shortcuts:

  • Mac OS: Command ⌘+C (copy) and Command ⌘+V (paste)

  • Windows: Ctrl C (copy) and Ctrl V (paste)


Column Summary Footer

Just like in a spreadsheet, Grid View provides quick summary controls in the footer of each column. Numeric fields include calculation shortcuts such as Sum, Average, and Median. Text-based and values list fields provide counts of Empty, Filled, % Filled, and % Empty.

πŸ“ Note: When Grouping is in use within Grid View, the column summary control gets a bit more advance, particularly when using Multiple Select fields with nested groups where the same record may be displayed multiple times. It's important to understand the column summary calculations will count unique records only. πŸ‘πŸ½


Smart Tips: Grid View

Click & Edit

Values immediately for Number, Currency and Text (Text, Text Area, SmartDoc) fields. This first click also activates the copy/paste feature.

Click Enter in Cells

To "activate" fields (cells), select and change values by field type. Examples include:

  • Values List fields, including Single Select, Multi Select, and Status fields

  • Linked Record fields opens the lookup modal

  • Files & Images fields open to the gallery carousel

Using the Spacebar

When a cell is engaged, clicking the spacebar opens the record window and scrolls directly to the field. This is useful when you're entering content and want to see the the full context of the record's data.

Deleting Data in Grid View

Clicking the Delete key in any cell deletes the data in the field (amazing, right! πŸ˜‰), saving the updates instantly. Bulk Delete can be used to remove multiple records at once in Grid View and is useful in staying organized.

Navigating Grid View with Your Keyboard

Just like in a spreadsheet, you can use the ⬅️ ➑️ ⬆️ ⬇️ arrow buttons or Tab to navigate between rows and columns.

Clicking Enter activates a cell and the ⬆️ ⬇️ arrow buttons can be used to scroll through values list fields such as Single Select and Multiple Select. Clicking Tab selects the highlighted value and navigates the cursor to the right.

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