Button/Rule formula cannot set only half of an uninitialized Date Range

Bugs & Issues
,
1

In a Button/Rule that uses a formula to set a Date Range field, if either part of the Date range is null, the action is silently ignored.

Context: I have a Date Range field “Actual” for noting the dates when a task is “Actually” started and completed (as opposed to “Scheduled” start and end). So the Start and End parts of the Date Range need to be set separately at different times.

Here is a Button formula that tries to set only the Start of a the Date Range field named ‘Actual’ (leaving the End as-is):

DateRange(
  Today(), [Step 1 Task].Actual.End()
)

But if the [Step 1 Task].Actual.End() is uninitialized, the action silently fails to update the field.

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2

Yeah. Date ranges require both values, and if one is blank, the range is undefined (and thus the field is empty).
I guess you could update the formula with an if (isempty())…then… option so that the date range defaults to something meaningful (although I’m not sure what you would want the default to be.

3

In the UI you can update only half of the range with no problem - it’s an automation issue.

For that matter it would be useful to have a Null constant in Formulas, so we can actually set something to null/empty. Anything that can be done in the UI should also be able to be done by Automation.

4

That’s not what I experience. Are you able to define open ended ranges?

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1 Like
5

For most fields, this can be done with ‘Clear the Field value’

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6

My mistake - you are right about that.

7

To be fair, I would like it to be possible. The alternative is two separate date fields, which is less intuitive/user-friendly.
In my case, it relates to this issue as well:

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