I have an emailed report that is scheduled. I last modified the template on 12/2 at 1:19pm and successfully ran a test subsequently at 1:23pm. I have the emailed report. This week it did not run as scheduled. Upon attempting to manually execute it, it failed. The report now generates an error when tested as follows:
Task ‘Send Mentor Plastic Report’ Body template. Expression ‘orderby(Select(IcarData [I-CAR ID],any([tdp mentor profile][mentor status])=”Active Approved”), any([tdp mentor profile][area tech trainer]))’ is invalid due to: Expression had error..
Which needless to say is not very specific or helpful. Nothing has been altered in the template or app. However, I did open the app and it did a “consistency update” on its own in between. Any ideas what could be going on? I don’t see any obvious problems.
Don’t know what your column types are, but it sounds the ORDERBY() doesn’t know what column it should use to sort as you are using ANY() for that purpose
Steve, can you elaborate? I’m not seeing what you believe I’m missing? Orderby needs a list of keys and a parameter to sort by separated by a comma. My select() function provides the list of keys separated by a comma, then the any() function provides the sort parameter. What might I be missing?
Again, the strange thing is that this template ran successfully last week and no changes have occurred since then to the app or the template other than an automatic “consistency” update applied by the editor when I opened it to glance at something since then.
I thought that might be the problem as well (despite it running successfully with the “any()” in place last week), so I removed that as the sort parameter and replaced it with a “normal” column instead. Still get the same error.
I guess I need a hint! I’ve read the doc and I’ve done dozens of templates just like this, and I’m either blind to what I should be seeing or just flat out missing it…
Here’s a very similar expression used in another template that executes perfectly fine, I don’t see any difference in syntax:
Task ‘Send Mentor Plastic Report’ Body template. Expression ‘orderby(Select(IcarData [I-CAR ID],any([tdp mentor profile][mentor status])=”Active Approved”), [location])’ is invalid due to: Expression had error..
Guys, I’m finding now that across the 13 apps I maintain, I’m receiving this same error on various previously working reports. Some have been running on a routine basis for over a year and have not been modified. I believe Appsheet has made a back-end change that is producing this problem.
Update: I found across 3 apps 4 reports not working, some of which have been running for over a year with no problems. All involve the use of this sort of dereference in the template code: [Some reference][Some column]. I don’t use this frequently so it was easy to spot as a common thread. I am working with support now, I assume Appsheet has introduced a bug.
Update: Support is still working on it. The issue seems to center around select or filter functions that make use of [Some ref][Some column] to generate a list of keys producing errors now when they did not in the past.
I had the same issue, 3 of my apps stopped working on December 5th, i got around the issue temporarily by moving the targeted data in the START expression into slices. Just this morning i realized by testing with another Webhook that it only had issues with dereference.
I have dealt with support in the past and for the most part they have helped, but getting passed that first line of support just didn’t seem very intriguing at the time when i had a lot of other stuff on my plate. I appreciate you getting after it.
Developers have been making a lot of changes to Expression Assistant in the app editor. Many of those changes have to also be implemented in the app and on the servers. To the best of my understanding, the app editor, the app itself, and the servers all have different software, so reproducing changes in one to the others can be a challenge. I’d guess your problems are rooted here.
I imagine you aren’t. That construct, dereferencing a column of list of Ref, is not widely used–it’s a more advanced tactic. And it’s possible you’re using it in an unusual way. Myself, I’m willing to chalk this up to the kind of thing that happens given the implementation complexity rather than some deficiency with the development or support teams.
@Steve Any chance you’d like to talk to the support folks? They don’t seem to understand the issue, or that the issue is new, or something. They have basically advised me that I have re-engineer the whole thing around not using the list dereference and their reasoning behind that was rather nonsensical: That you cannot reference a table not called out in the event that triggers a bot, so I must use “for each row in table” and have separate emails for each row (which is not going to happen as that doesn’t fit my use case at all) and it be triggered by the length of the table over time instead of on a schedule.
Scheduled events never reference tables in the triggering event! I hate to sound critical, but I don’t think they know what they’re talking about. That, or they’re trying to get me to use a work-around that will not produce like results.
@PCV_Tech I encourage you to file a ticket if you have not already.
