Format Rules on Configurable Tables: Color Cells and Hide Rows

Format rules work like conditional formatting in a spreadsheet. You give a column one or more conditions, and each one either colors the cell or hides the row wherever the condition is true. Use them to highlight agents under target, flag the rows that need a coach's attention, or hide the rows nobody needs to see.

Format rules run in your browser on the rows the table has already loaded. Adding, changing or reordering a rule redraws the table straight away and never reloads the data. Everyone who opens the dashboard sees the same colors and the same hidden rows.

Above, Utilization score has three color bands, Off-floor share turns red above 25%, and Coaching flag is highlighted only when the agent is also under 80. A hide rule on Shift type removes the agent with no activity, and the table says so: 7 of 8 agents shown · 1 hidden by format rules.

Before you start

Format rules are set by dashboard editors. Anyone who can edit the dashboard can add, change and remove them in edit mode. Viewers see the result, and can open a column's rules to read them, but cannot change them.
They work on configurable tables, such as the agents, tickets and organizations tables, on any column, formula columns included.
Saving rules by name for reuse needs the manage saved format rules permission. Admins have it.

Step 1: Open a column's filter

Click Edit on the dashboard. Each column header now shows a filter icon. Click it on the column you want to work on.

For a quick filter, use the popover that opens. Text columns list their values (tick the ones to keep, with No value for empty cells), and number, percent and duration columns offer a comparison such as More than or Between. Click Apply and the rows that don't match are hidden. This is saved as an ordinary hide rule, listed in the panel as a Header filter.

For anything more, color included, click Color and more format rules.

Step 2: Review the column's format rules

The Format & filter column panel opens beside the table, and the table stays visible. The column you're editing is outlined, and every change redraws the table as you make it. Each rule is a card that describes, in words, what the rule does.

Order matters. Rules run top to bottom, and for color the first rule that matches a cell wins. Drag a card by its handle, or use the arrows, to reorder.
Switch columns without closing. The Select column menu at the top moves to another column, and each column keeps its unsaved changes.
A column holds up to 10 format rules.

Step 3: Add or edit a rule: When, Then, Style

Click Add another format rule, or click a card to open it. Each rule has three parts.

When: the condition, picked from a menu of shortcuts: Value is not empty, Value is empty, Value is an error, comparisons such as greater than, less than or equal to, Value is between, Value is one of, Every cell (color only), or Custom formula is.
Then: Color the cell or Hide the row.
Style (for color): one of the preset swatches, or your own fill and text colors.

Under the style, the card shows the formula the shortcut stands for. Edit as formula turns the shortcut into a custom formula you can extend. Click Done to close the card, then Save at the bottom of the panel. One Save writes every column you changed.

Step 4 (optional): Write a custom formula

When the shortcuts aren't enough, choose Custom formula is. It uses the same spreadsheet syntax as formula columns: IF, AND, OR, NOT, ISBLANK, ISERROR, ROUND, ABS, comparisons and percent literals such as 25%. The rule applies wherever the formula is TRUE.

{{this}} is the column the rule belongs to, for example {{this}} > 25%.
To read another column on the same table, pick it from Insert a column…. It's added as that column's reference, so the formula keeps working if the column header is renamed.

This rule colors Coaching flag red only where it says "Review breaks" and the agent's Utilization score is under 80. That combination isn't possible with a shortcut alone.

Reuse rules: saved format rules

Built a set of rules you want on other columns, such as the same green, yellow and red bands on every utilization column? In the panel, click Save these format rules by name…. On any other column, Apply saved format rules… picks one up.

Saved rules are linked, not copied. Edit a saved set, and every column using it changes. Detach a column to give it its own copy you can change on its own.
Each set has a reach: any column on any table (rules that read only {{this}}), any column of one table type, or only the column it was saved from.
All of the account's saved sets are listed under Settings › Format Rules, where you can rename, re-scope or delete them.

How rules combine

Hiding beats color. A row that any hide rule matches is hidden, so nothing paints it.
Hide rules on every column add up. Any one of them hides the row.
The winning color rule sets both colors. A fill from one rule and a text color from another are never mixed.
A color rule paints only its own column, so rules on different columns never clash.
Totals and summary rows are never hidden or colored, and a totals row (a column rollup) still counts every loaded row, hidden ones included: a hide rule changes what you see, not what the rollup is computed over (Column Formulas and Column Rollups).

The info icon next to Format rules in the panel lists these rules too. Sorting, resizing and adding columns keep your rules, and the table's in-page CSV download leaves out the hidden rows, as you see them.

Troubleshooting

I don't see the filter icon on a header. Click Edit first. Outside edit mode, the icon appears only on columns that already have rules.
The icon on a header shows a warning. A rule hit an error on some rows, such as #DIV/0!. That rule is skipped for those rows, and the next rule gets its turn. Hover the icon to see how many rows it couldn't check, then wrap the formula in IFERROR or add a Value is an error rule above it.
A color rule never shows. A rule above it is probably matching first. Move it up, or narrow the rule above.
The totals row doesn't match the rows I see. Totals count every loaded row, including the ones format rules hide.