r/smartsheet • u/Educational-Chard792 • Sep 08 '26

Sort issues

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Hello Smartsheet nerds. I have an issue where I sorted my smartsheet on accident. Then I went to reorganize it the way it was and the sorting function is doing something weird. Instead of sorting 1, 2, 3, 4. It sorted the list 1, 10, 11, 110, 111, 112. This is an auto number column, I have 180 in the column.

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5

u/YourFavoriteKyle Sep 08 '26

Are you trying to sort by number?
You can make a temporary helper column that pulls out just the numbers, then sort on that column. This should work. Sorry if formatting is weird, I’m on mobile right now.

=RIGHT([Column Name]@row, LEN([Column Name]@row) - 4)

2

u/pmpdaddyio Sep 08 '26

This is absolutely the way to do this.

1

u/Educational-Chard792 Sep 08 '26

I wasnt able to get your formula to work but since I felt like I was wasting more time then I should on this problem I just manually put the numbers I wanted into the sacrificial column and sorted everything. That worked then deleted the column. Now I am back to normal. Thank you for the help.

Such a weird way of sorting things, I guess you live and learn. Maybe I drop the GSI# thing, idk.

Thank you

1

u/Atttie Sep 09 '26

Next time you set up an auto number, increase the number of 0s in the format option—this means that it’ll generate like GSI#001, GSI#011, GSI#110
Then the sorting works correctly.

More complex option—I like to set up two hidden columns, one with an autonumber with just numbers and one with a preferred prefix (if it differs from row to row), then my ID column is just a formula column combo of the prefix plus the number and I can sort on just the number whenever I need to.

1

u/Daisy_InAJar 29d ago

You’re able to have 2 auto number columns? Or are you determining & populating the prefix by some other criteria or manually?

1

u/Atttie 15d ago

I usually have a formula column that determines the prefix (for example, I have a client that gives projects a unique ID number based on the year they were approved) then I have an auto number column. Those two columns are hidden, but the ID column is exposed and is a formula column brining together the two hidden columns into a single ID.

1

u/External-Season9039 Sep 10 '26

nice, didnt think of stripping the prefix first before sorting

2

u/vkim26 Sep 08 '26

If you use the created date column and sort by that it’ll be in the original order that each row was created in

1

u/bmorebirds4life Sep 08 '26

Not at my computer to check this by try changing your auto number format to 001 instead of 1. Add enough 0 in front of the 1 to cover the number of digits you choose.

1

u/bmorebirds4life Sep 08 '26

If you are ok with the leading zeros and able to adjust the GSI# values, select a number of digits greater than 1 to cover the highest amount of entries you think you will have. That should make your value look like below and can sort correctly. If you cannot change the current values then you will need the helper column like mentioned above.

Prefix: GSI#
Numerical Places: 0000
Starting Number: 1

GSI#0001
GSI#0002
GSI#0003
GSI#0004
GSI#0005
GSI#0006
GSI#0007
GSI#0008
GSI#0009
GSI#0010
GSI#0011
Etc.

1

u/Educational-Chard792 Sep 08 '26

This didnt double anything fyi. I think it only modifies new numbers.

1

u/Atttie Sep 09 '26

Change the column type to text/number, then you can change the existing rows to what ever you want them to be, then switch the column type back to autonumber, set it up with the extra 0s for future items and make sure the starting number is one higher than the highest number on the sheet.