Important Documentation Update | Table lookup functions

[Joseph_Seddik]

Problem:

If I am a new user to AppSheet, started to read AppSheet's official guides and documentation, there is no way I could learn about table lookup functions: SELECT, FILTER, LOOKUP, and REF_ROWS, (also MINROW and MAXROW) unless I go to the list of all functions and open them one by one. 

Users with no previous database knowledge (who would anticipate the presence of these functions and look for them) and those who have not seen the community are especially disadvantaged here. 

For example, this guide:

1. Expressions: The Essentials | AppSheet Help Center

Contains what seems to be an inclusive list of all AppSheet's expression Categories:

Yet, none of them would lead you to table lookup functions.

Also this page:

2. EXPRESSIONS | AppSheet Help Center 

Which lists ten different Expression Types

None of these types has a single mention of table lookup functions in its corresponding page. 

In fact these functions are NEVER cited in any AppSheet documentation page. The only exception is that FILTER() is cited in SELECT() page and vice versa, and the same goes for the rest of similar functions. Other than that you have no way of discovering these functions. 

Update Proposal:

Create a new page for Table Lookup Functions (or name it as you see appropriate), that groups these functions and explain their general purpose, and cite this new page among the Categories of page 1. and the Types of page 2.

[SkrOYC]

I understand where you go with this but I don't think I'm with you.

What I mean by this may be related to my own personality and experience.

I had no background on any programming languaje and any knowledge on database normalization. When I started with AppSheet it was not intuitive at all. I tried to make what my excel knowledge told me and almost nothing worked here.

But I was diligent on the docs. I saved almost half of it on Pocket to read it offline again and again. It all made sense when I gave time and patience do it's thing. Also I read about RDB and it was a big jump for me.

So, in general, I think that new users shouldn't have an easier way to find what they think should work inside AppSheet from their previous knowledge, they should read the whole docs without jumping sections to make sure they understand the platform they are in before making mistakes and yell about "things not working".

In other words, and again, this is my opinion, personality and experience, users should read more, specialy before they jump into the editor and get how AppSheet works instead of "How can I apply my excel/sheet experience on this 'Apps from spreadsheets' platform". Also there is a huge responsability on the advertising about what the AppSheet platform is and what ....

IMHO, AppSheet is not a no-code tool and it doesn't magically turn spreadsheets into fully feature apps. I mean, it does if you don't care about ugly field names and you don't need any of the automation stuff. In general, just simple form of apps are no-code. Medium and Up will need you to get at least a basic understanding on expressions, what they do, why, what are the inputs and which is the output

[lizlynch]

Hello and apologies for the delay in replying to you!

Thank you for this feedback (and for the additional feedback in the response)!

@Steve kindly created the following Community article, which you can refer to in the meantime: 
FAQ: FILTER(), LOOKUP(), MAXROW(), MINROW(), REF_ROWS(), and SELECT()

I will work to incorporate this information into the documentation, as well. We also have some improvements coming soon (in the next month or so) that will enable you to filter the reference by category, including by Table lookup. Stay tuned! 

Thank you for this great feedback and helping to improve the documentation!

Liz