Power Automate - Trigger when Excel file changes

[Anonymous]

Hi All,

There is a excel sheet g=hosted on SharePoint having list of tasks. When user will select 'Assigned To' column from excel and select one user from excel drop down, I want to run the FLOW and create a bucket in 'To Do' group having task name and assigned User Name.

Can you guide me on this? I am thinking that if I get a trigger when excel gets updated and the values then I will connect to Planner and create it but not able to find any trigger.

Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks,

Sanjay

[abm]

Hi @Anonymous 

There are no triggers available for Excel connector when a row gets updated.  The only trigger available is a manual selection of row.

Thanks

[Anonymous]

Hi @abm ,

Thank you for your reply.

Then in my scenario, what approach should I use to achieve my requirement? Any suggestions? User wants to update in excel only and wants to get bucket created in Planner.

Thanks,

Sanjay

[abm]

Hi @Anonymous 

You could use the trigger as scheduled interval then read the excel rows (Use a filter to identify whether the records are already created or not). Once the bucket planner is created update the excel row. Add a new column in your excel sheet called Update (Yes/No) so that when you read the excel sheet use the filter to get the records which are not created.

Thanks

[Gulthaw]

Hi @abm ,

Do you know if this trigger will ever be added? We are currently working with a sheet on google to control equipment repairs that sends a specific mail whenever there's an edit. We are migrating to O365 and I'm in charge of migrating the code and everything else.

The thing is, from what you wrote, I would need to create a scheduled interval every 1 minute or so.

It would be nice to have that trigger to be honest.

[abm]

Hi @Gulthaw 

Not sure when this feature is going to be added. Have a look at this idea forum thread and vote for it.

Excel - Add row - Power Platform Community (microsoft.com)

Thanks

[tan4a]

Hi abm, i had come up with that solution for an email i want to send based on the data being updated in excel, but then i can't get the excel file to update the yes/no in the new column for all rows. The function 'update a row' will update the first row in the in the list that meets my criteria, not the rest - so the subsequent rows are just getting the flow continually repeated (an email every hour in my case)

any ideas on how to update multiple rows in the flow?

[abm]

Hi @tan4a 

The updates can do only by specifying which record it is hence we need to provide the identifier. If you want the filter to meet the criteria more than one record means you need to find the common identifier for multiple records. This way filter can pick up more than one records.

[tan4a]

thanks @abm 

I was using a common identifier, but it was only updating the first row it got to that met that criteria, not the rest of them. But this got me thinking, and what I did was go back and put a unique identifier in, and then it worked!!

So if anyone wants to know exactly how I did it..

My excel table has a column that staff update to prompt and email to be sent (in my case 'update' column, I am looking for a 'Successful' entry there

I added a column 'Post Successful email sent' (to be able to record/identify which ones had has an email so they don't get multiples each time the recurrence runs)

And of course the table has other columns including the email address of the person I want to get the email in there too

so for the Power Automate flow

Scheduled recurrence to go to Excel and list the rows (I set on the hour, but could be more/less often of course)

then use the 'Apply to each' and 'Condition' criteria to identify those rows with 'Successful' in the update column, and not yet a 'Yes' in the 'Post Successful email sent' column

then send the email if that criteria are met (all pretty standard so far)

then update the Excel row to add the 'Yes' for each of those rows that we have just sent the email for

**here is where I was stuck - you can't use a column that has common entries for more than one row. I was at first trying to look for rows that had 'Successful' in them and then add the 'Yes', but that didn't work as it did the first row it go to that met that criteria and then didn't do any more of them (much swearing and cursing ensued). The Key Column and Key Value has to be unique for each row, so in my case I used my 'Action' column which is unique for each row.

and that's it, it now works perfectly

Seems so simple now I have worked it out 🤦‍♀️

I hope this saves someone else the frustration I experienced in running emails from excel using power automate when there is a change to the excel row content 😉 

[abm]

Hi @tan4a 

Thanks for the update. Yes a common identifier to get all the related records and you need a unique identifier for the update.

[daquilje]

I'm sorry if this is slightly unrelated, but I was wondering if the list rows features could be used and then sent to some sort of logging document (like a sharepoint list or an excel file or something), and then via that list you could determine whether or not a table was updated?

It seems quite similar to your problem statement.

Best,

Joey

[takolota]

Workaround for "When an Excel row is created", "When an Excel row is modified", and/or "When an Excel row is deleted" triggers

This template triggers some time after users edit an Excel workbook in SharePoint & then for the target Excel table, returns a different set for records that were created, records that were modified, & records that were deleted. This way we can set up additional actions & processes for each edit users made in our target Excel table.
https://powerusers.microsoft.com/t5/Power-Automate-Cookbook/When-an-Excel-row-is-created-modified-or...