Project task templating with automations

Do you find yourself typing the same tasks over and over for your projects? Instead of entering these tasks each time that you create a project, you can create an automation to automatically add the tasks when you choose the project type.

We will use 4 tables, 3 relationships, and 1 automation to automate task entry. Let’s see how to set this up.

Step 1: Create the table and fields

The templating process for our example is based on having these tables in place:

1. Project Type: holds the project types that will be related to the sets of tasks on the Task Template table and to the projects on the Projects table.
2. Tasks Template: holds the actual template for the tasks and the Project Types they are associated with.
3. Projects: holds project data and is where the automation will be triggered.
4. Tasks: holds the tasks that the automation copies from the Tasks Template This table needs to have the same fields and field types as the fields on the Tasks Template table.

Step 2: Create the relationships

Next create the relationships between your tables as per the relationship diagram.

1. One Project Type has many Task Templates. This ensures that the proper set of tasks are copied over when the Project Type is assigned
2. One Project Type has many Projects. This ensures that the proper template is assigned to the project based on the Project Type assigned to it.
3. One Project has many Tasks. This ensures that when the automation copies over the tasks, they are associated with the proper project.

Step 3: Create your automation

The automation copies the data from the Tasks Template table into the Tasks table and associates it by the related Project.

Create the automation to trigger when data changes.

1. Click When data changes to set the trigger
2. Enter a name for your automation: Template Automation
3. Enter a comment for your automation that will help you or another builder understand the automation in the future
4. Configure the trigger to when a user modifies a record in the Projects table
5. Set the additional criteria to start the automation when Any of the following fields change and select Project Type

Create the action to copy records to the Tasks table.

1. Click Add an action
2. Click Copy records
3. Click Next – will say Finish if you don’t have any relationships
4. Choose the Tasks Template table as your source
5. Choose the Tasks table as your destination

Configure the action to add data into fields in a new record.

1. Open the Filter Records section and set the condition to Project Type to Trigger: Projects: Project Type
2. For Field, select the field that you want to copy from the Tasks Template table.
3. For Source, select Copy value from another record
4. For Value, select Source: Tasks Template and the correct field
5. Click the + icon to add new rows for additional fields and repeat steps 2-4
6. Add the “Related Project” to create the relationship with the project: for Field, select Related Project
7. For Source, select Copy value from another record
8. For Value, select Trigger: Projects: Record ID#
9. Click Save & close

Great job! You have created a task template with an automation!

Looking for more on how you could be using Automations in your app?
Audit Logging with Automations
About Quick Base Automations (Help)
Working with Automations (University Lesson)
Complex Workflow and Automations (University Lesson)