Changelog

New features, improvements and fixes to Datablist.

November 2021

New features

Automatic duplicates merging

Last month, we released Datablist Duplicates Finder to find and list collection items with duplicate values. Yet, processing those duplicates was a manual task.

Not anymore! In November, Duplicates Finder got an upgrade to automatically merge non-conflicting items.

What are non-conflicting items?

  • Items with similar values for all their properties
  • Items with complementary values

Merging Assistant

For items with conflicting values found with Datablist Duplicates Finder or to merge items directly from a collection, we introduce a Merging Assistant.

It shows two or more items, automatically select the item with the most information as Primary Item and allow merging data from other items into this Primary Item.

Import/Export Excel files

In addition to CSV, Microsoft Excel files have been added as import and export format.

To import a Microsoft Excel file, the data must be on the first worksheet and display a Table like structure.

Improvements

Properties data types

In November, built-in data types received improvements. Current built-in types are:

  • Text
  • Long Text
  • Checkbox
  • Email
  • Url
  • Datetime
  • Date
  • Number

During data import (CSV or Excel), Datablist scans the first 100 lines to automatically detect data types.

Collection search and sort actions are compatible with all those built-in data types.

In the detail drawer, data validation is performed to forbid non valid data inputs.

Empty cell en backspace/delete key press

Last month, bulk delete was added to empty several cells with the "Delete"/"Backspace" key. Now it also works on a single cell.

Fix freeze on big CSV file import

On very large files (more than 50mo), Datablist CSV Importer could freeze as browser memory became full.

Now, CSV files are read chunk by chunk to handle large files.

Currently, Datablist only import the first 10k lines but this is an important step toward higher volume of data.

October 2021

New features

Use Datablist without signing up

Datablist is a great tool for simple data manipulations like removing duplicates, filtering CSV, consolidating lists, etc.

It is now possible to upload CSV files and play with them without being registered.

Go to https://app.datablist.com/ and create a collection to get started.

The data is kept in your browser storage. Sign in to sync it to the cloud and share it with your team.

Duplicates Finder

Until now, you could merge duplicate items by using the "unique values" setting on a property. It worked but it was not possible to preview duplicates before merging them and it worked only during imports.

With our new Duplicates Finder feature, finding duplicates is easier than ever. Select the property(ies) to compare and run the analysis!

"Long Text" property

Writing notes (or any long text) on Datablist is now possible with the new Long Text property type. It opens a write zone on the table and shows as a Textarea on the drawer.

Undo/Redo Manager

Try, iterate, cancel. Undo/Redo has been implemented on:

  • Item edit
  • Column size change
  • Cells bulk delete (see improvements)

Use Cmd+Z (undo) and Cmd+Shift+Z (redo) on your collections.

Improvements

Cells bulk delete

Empty all the selected cells with the "Delete"/"Backspace" key as you would do on a spreadsheet.

Quick collection creation

Creating a collection is now a one step process. Click the "+" button and you will be redirected to an empty collection page.

Export selected items

Sometimes you want to export selected items instead of the whole listing. Now you can 🤟

September 2021

New features

Invite members

You can now invite people to join your account and access your collections.

Just enter their email addresses to send invitations.

Improvements

Always Visible Listing

Drawer and actions launcher appear in the data listing and could hide the listing. Now, the listing is always fully visible with the drawer or the action launcher open.

Fixes

Scrollbars

Datablist is built with thin, disappearing scrollbars in mind (Mac OS X). In Linux and Windows, in Datablist app, scrollbars were always visible in modals and double scrollbars were visible in data listing. It should be better now.

However, it is not perfect and on large listing, the vertical scrollbar is only accessible after horizontal scrolling. Custom scrollbars will be implemented in the future.

Copy/Pasting

Fix bug when copy/pasting a single cell

Fix bug when copy/pasting a selection after changing sorting options.

August 2021

New features

Users and Accounts

Identity management and account management has been improved. Data now belong to accounts and accounts have user members. This change paves the way to team management and access controls.

New action

Email Address Validation

Performing an email list cleaning on Datablist is now simple. Just select the email addresses in your collection and run the "Email Address Validation" action.

This free service does 3 verifications:

  • Email syntax analysis
  • Disposable providers check
  • Domain MX records check

👉 Check our How to clean an email list for free guide!

Improvements

Export visible or all properties

Collection properties can be hidden on the listing view. When exporting your collection to CSV, when at least one property is hidden, you can choose between two export options:

  • Export only visible properties
  • Export all properties

When clicking on "Export all properties", the CSV file will contains columns for all properties, including the hidden ones.

Copy/pasting data with selected items

After copy/pasting data from cells, you can now copy selected items (single items or all collection items) using "Edit -> Copy" or the Ctrl + c keyboard shortcut.

UI Improvements

The rename and delete collection actions are now directly accessible from the collection tree in the sidebar.

Limit CSV and copy/pasting imports to 10k items

Datablist is currently tested to work smoothly with 10k items collections. This limit is temporary and will be increased in the future.

May 2021

New Features

Copy-Pasting

Copy-pasting is natural way of importing and exporting data between applications. We wanted to do it right to be compatible with most of the tools you already use.

In May, we implemented copy-pasting from other spreadsheets applications, from html tables and smart copy-pasting between Datablist collections.

On a Datablist collection page, when you paste data, you can create new properties, or map the properties from you pasted data with your existing collection properties.

Spreadsheets Copy/Pasting

Starting from now, you can copy and paste data between Datablist and spreadsheets (Google Sheets, Airtable, Excel, etc.).

Html Table Copy/Pasting

When pasting html data into Datablist, if a html table is found, Datablist automatically extracts the content. And if headers are available, we use them to create collection properties.

This feature also works in the other way, when copying data from Datablist to paste it in Notion, Typora, etc. Datablist copies a html version of your data for applications that handle it.

Smart Copy/Pasting between Datablist collections

Finally, playing with data between Datablist collections has never been easier! When you copy and paste items from a Datablist collection to another one, it keeps your collection proprieties options (name, data type, etc). On the property mapping step, when creating new properties, it will keep the options from the source properties.

New actions launcher

We want to provide a smooth user experience. Managing your data in Datablist must be as simple as using a spreadsheet, while taking advantage of more structured data types.

Structured data types allow you to run actions directly from your items in Datablist. In May, we've revamped this "actions launcher"!

Now, available actions are displayed directly once you have at least one selected item.

We have also improved how to select items quickly. You can click and maintain your click pressed while moving over the item checkboxes to select several items, fast!

Sidebar Resizing

For large screens or complex collections hierarchy, you can now resize your left sidebar.

New keyboard shortcuts

ctrl + f to search

ctrl + a to select all items

News Actions

Fetch RSS posts

Create items from RSS/Atom feeds. Use this actions to build prospect lists, etc.

Get webpage title and description

This action fetches meta information from a domain url. It returns the page title, description and indicate when the action couldn't connect to the domain server.

Fetch Alexa statistics on domains

When building listings of prospects, competitors, etc. an Alexa data is a goldmine for competitive analysis. Alexa Ranking, estimated web traffic, number of inbound links. With the Alexa action, get insights on website to detect opportunities.