Eliminate the 2-cell-wide blank border around PI Builder data
When I import data using PI Builder, I usually want to filter the data and create calculated columns, but these prove to be more painful than necessary.
If I put filters on the columns containing PI Builder data and then click on the filter dropdown arrow, every column will contain "(Blanks)" as an entry because the 2 blank rows underneath the PI Builder data are included as part of the PI Builder data. This happens because PI Builder modified these rows during the import.
Calculated columns are useful to modify the values in an existing column. For the fill-down to work when you double-click on the fill handle (bottom right corner of a selected cell), the calculated column must be directly beside the PI Builder data. However, this doesn't work because the 2 columns to the right of the PI Builder data are formatted as text, so any formula that you write in them will be treated as text. It is a pain to always eliminate the text formatting or delete the columns.
In both cases, please ensure that PI Builder does not modify more cells than it needs to.
Kenneth Barber
shared this idea
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Kenneth Barber
commented
Hi Chris. Is there a timeline for the fix?
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I can see that the "Clear to Empty Cell Boundary" option is not always being honored in the new import case, only during "Retrieve". We will try to address that in a future release.
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I can see that the "Clear to Empty Cell Boundary" option is not always being honored in the new import case, only during "Retrieve". We will try to address that in a future release.
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Kenneth Barber
commented
Actually, that doesn't achieve what I want. I still get a border of blank, modified cells.
I understand that the blank border helps to isolate PI Builder data into its own "current region" (that's an Excel term), but I don't understand why the border cells need to be modified by PI Builder, especially when I import data into a new sheet.
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Under the Settings menu item, for the Retrieve tab, there is a setting to control the addition of the two row/column border. If you change the setting to "Clear to Empty Cell boundary, and then also leave the header row blank past the last PI Builder utilized column, this should achieve what you want.
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Kenneth Barber
commented
This would hopefully be solved if this were implemented:
https://feedback.osisoft.com/forums/555148-pi-server/suggestions/18668149-use-excel-tables-to-contain-pi-builder-data
