Google Sheets Formula for Pulling Specific Values in Two Ways

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I'm trying to do a couple of different things with a spreadsheet in Google and running into some problems with the formulas I am using. I'm hoping someone might be able to direct me to a better solution or be able to correct the current issue I'm having.

First off all, here is a view of the data on Sheet 1 that I am pulling from:

Example Spreadsheet

The first task I'm trying to accomplish is to create a sheet that lists all of these shift days with the date in one column and the subject ("P: Ben" or S: Nicole") in another column. This sheet would be used to import the data via a CSV into our calendar system each month. I tried doing an Index-Match where it used the date to pull the associated values however I found that I had to keep adjusting the formula offsets in order to capture new information. It doesn't seem like Index-Match works when multiple rows/columns are involved. Is there a better way to pull this information?

The second task I am trying to accomplish is to create a new tab which lists all the dates a specific person is assigned too (that way this tab will update in real time and everyone can just look at their own sheet to see what days they are on-call). However, I run into the same problem here because for each new row I have to change the formula to reflect the correct information otherwise it doesn't pull the correct cell when it finds a match.

I would appreciate any and all information/advice on how to accomplish these tasks with the formula combination I mentioned or suggestions on other formulas to use that I have not been able to find.

Thanks in advance!

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google-sheets

1 Answers

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Brandon. There are a few ways to attack your tasks, but looking at the structure of your data, I would use curly brackets {} to create arrays. Here is an excerpt of how Google explains arrays in Sheets:

You can also create your own arrays in a formula in your spreadsheet by using brackets { }. The brackets allow you to group together values, while you use the following punctuation to determine which order the values are displayed in:

  • Commas: Separate columns to help you write a row of data in an array. For example, ={1, 2} would place the number 1 in the first cell and the number 2 in the cell to the right in a new column.
  • Semicolons: Separate rows to help you write a column of data in an array. For example, ={1; 2} would place the number 1 in the first cell and the number 2 in the cell below in a new row.

Note: For countries that use commas as decimal separators (for example €1,00), commas would be replaced by backslashes () when creating arrays.

You can join multiple ranges into one continuous range using this same punctuation. For example, to combine values from A1-A10 with the values from D1-D10, you can use the following formula to create a range in a continuous column: ={A1:A10; D1:D10}

Knowing that, here's a sample sheet of your data.

First Task:

create a sheet that lists all of these shift days with the date in one column and the subject ("P: Ben" or S: Nicole") in another column.

To organize dates and subjects into discrete arrays, we'll collect them using curly brackets...

  • Dates: {A3:G3,A7:G7,A11:G11,A15:G15}
  • Subjects: {A4:G4,A5:G5,A8:G8,A9:G9,A12:G12,A13:G13,A16:G16,A17:G17}

This actually produces two rows rather than columns, but we'll deal with that in a minute. You'll note that, because there are two subjects per every one date, we need to effectively double each date captured.

  • Dates: {A3:G3,A3:G3,A7:G7,A7:G7,A11:G11,A11:G11,A15:G15,A15:G15}
  • Subjects: {A4:G4,A5:G5,A8:G8,A9:G9,A12:G12,A13:G13,A16:G16,A17:G17}

Still with me? If so, all that's left is to (a) turn these two rows into two columns using the TRANSPOSE function, (b) combine our two columns using another pair of curly brackets and a semicolon and (c) add a SORT function to list the dates in chronological order...

=SORT(TRANSPOSE({{A3:G3,A3:G3,A7:G7,A7:G7,A11:G11,A11:G11,A15:G15,A15:G15};{A4:G4,A5:G5,A8:G8,A9:G9,A12:G12,A13:G13,A16:G16,A17:G17}}),1,TRUE)

Second Task:

create a new tab which lists all the dates a specific person is assigned too (that way this tab will update in real time and everyone can just look at their own sheet to see what days they are on-call).

Assuming the two-column array we just created lives in A2:B53 on a new sheet called "Shifts," then we can use the FILTER function and SEARCH based on each name. The formula at the top of Ben's sheet would look like this:

=FILTER(Shifts!A2:B53,SEARCH("Ben",Shifts!B2:B53))

Hopefully this helps, but please let me know if I've misinterpreted anything. Cheers.