Currently, Automations used against Timeline columns default to the End Date; For our use case we’d like to have the option to toggle to Start Date. We use Timelines to track customer-defined time periods, which vary in length. We’d like the notification to trigger an action prior to the customer’s window opening. We need notifications based on the Start Date so we have a consistent lead time for each Timeline entry. The lack of consistency impairs adoption of monday more fully in our organization.
It’s been suggested to have an additional column with just the Start Date. A solution, yes, but this creates more work- not the goal of automating tasks, obviously. It also creates more unnecessary elements on the Timeline View that muddies the view or requires additional steps to filter out.
I also used the Formula Column to extract the Start Date from the Timeline column, This populated the whole column at once, however, currently it’s not possible to refer to Formula columns in Automations.
Either of 2 features would work for us: The option to choose the Start or End Date when referring an automation to a Timeline Column, or, allow Automations to act on a Formula Column.
PLEASE!
I want to use Kanban with my team. I can’t have tasks move between “not due” and “ready to start” without this feature.
Jack
My team inevitably needs to be told when to start a task. But, they want it off their list once they did start. My solution was to add a Start Date + Start Status. Once the person changed the status to started, the date would be marked complete, hence removing it from their weekly list view. It’s cumbersome, requires extra steps, and not everyone on the team likes it.
There must be a better way. Not a perfect solution (still requires an extra step, but maybe a checkbox, that is directly connected to the start date. Once the box is checked, it goes away.
Any suggestions to manage start dates would be appreciated. : )
Has there been any more update on this? Seems like a fundamental feature missing here given the fact that the essence of a ‘timeline’ is about organising things around a Start AND End date.
Am i missing something here? 
Unfortunately there’s nothing new to report on this issue, at least from the monday.com team. I’m experimenting with a couple of the 3rd party apps available in the marketplace- General Caster and Start + End = Timeline - to try and solve my issue. It totally seems like this is a “feature” upgrade that monday.com could make on their own but it doesn’t seem to have been a very high priority.
Stay in touch if you find a solution.
Yay! Finally they’ve implemented it.
I’ve started testing today.
That’s great news! Eager to get in there and get started myself. Thanks for letting me know, I hadn’t seen it anywhere prior.
As @djbeame metioned, it is now possible to select the start / end of timelines when creating automations. It’s worth noting that this is achieved via the custom automations 
You can access the custom automations by heading to the Automation Center and selecting the animated button at the top of the page to create your own custom automation.
Best,
Dani
Thanks, found it and have several new automations working already.
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