When an item that is connected to another board using a two-way connect boards column is deleted, the deleted item remains linked. This presents a lot of potential issues for automations.
Additionally, I’ve been unable to figure out a way using Integromat to clear said connect boards column. Using the “Update column values of a specific item”, I’ve tried inserting a null value, but this appears to have no effect (oddly, it actually seems to have worked once, but now does not work ).
Thanks JCorrell! That is what I attempted, but it didn’t seem to work consistently. I believe I found an alternative for my current workflow, but I will try this again if needed.
One other thing that could be an issue… many of the updates to connected boards/mirror columns are handled asynchronously. So, depending on how busy those servers, are it can take some time.
My past experience has been that it has sometimes taken more than a minute. However, this seems to have been improving.
There is something odd behind the scenes. I’m doing experiments with a two-way linked columns that when you clear the column on board A should clear the associated column on board B.
Nullifying a connect-boards column only works from the board which the item was linked from. If you form links bidirectionally, you can get then nullify on either board. However if you’re linking asymmetrically with more than 2 items on each board, you can get into a situation where you can actually have an item with an orphaned connection even though it is bidirectional.
I would have to build out a big truth table of columns, item links, and which side originated the link and what clears what - and it appears its sequence dependent too.
For my needs though fortunately I am saying Board A allows linking to ONE item, and board B allows linking to multiple items. Board B is also restricted, so the links on board B are always generated by linking to B from A. That way I can nullify A before deletion and it will remove that link from B.
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