Editing the Formula Grid

The Formula Grid allows you to plan, store, and track your formulas. Here you can plan your experiments in a format similar to Excel while enriching the experience with interconnected data. The Formula Grid can be found within the Formulation section of a Project and is directly linked with the Inventory module, creating bidirectional links between your projects, formulations, and real-time Inventory. 

Creating New Formulations and Editing Existing Formulations

When you start a new project, the Formula Grid will be empty. You can create new formulations or edit existing formulations by navigating to the Formula Grid within your desired Project. From there, you can add new raw materials, intermediate products, or formulas to your formulation.

To search the Inventory and add new raw materials or intermediate products to your Project, navigate to the Formula Grid within the desired Project, select the “Add New” button in the top right corner of the page, and select “Inventory”. From there, you will be prompted to add either Raw Material, Consumable, or a Formula. Each new Inventory item you add to your Formula Grid will populate a new row in the Grid. 

You can also add one or multiple formulas to your Project. Albert will assign a unique ID to each formula, which is a combination of the project ID and an incrementing number. To add a new formula to your Project, navigate to the Formulation Grid within the desired Project, select the “Add New” button in the top right corner of the page, and select “Formula." Each new formula you add to your Formula Grid will populate a new column in the Grid.

Editing Formula Values 

The Formula Grid in Albert is similar to the grid in a program such as Excel. You can perform many similar bulk actions as you can with Excel, such as copy and paste. This allows you to quickly create new formulas to your specifications. 

To edit formula values, first ensure your Formula is unlocked, noted by the absence of the lock icon and the formula total represented in green.

Left: Unlocked Formula | Right: Locked Formula

For information on how to unlock Locked Formulas, navigate to this help article.

Copying and Pasting Formula Values

You can copy and paste formula values into new cell(s) by selecting the cells you wish to copy and hitting Ctrl+C (on a PC keyboard) or Command+C (on a Mac keyboard). To paste the values into the new cell(s), select another cell and hit Ctrl+V or Command+V on your keyboard to automatically paste the copied values into the cells.

Dragging Formula Values

Selected cell values can also be copied into adjacent cells by selecting the bottom right corner of the selected area and dragging it into adjacent cells. This will copy the selected cells into the newly highlighted cells. 

Removing Formula Values

To remove all of the values within a Formula, select the entire Formula column by clicking in the Formula ID cell. Press Delete on your keyboard to remove all of the values within that formula. 

Note: If a Formula has been used in a Task, the Formula will be locked. You will have to unlock the Formula in order to edit it.

Change the Order of Raw Materials in your Formula Grid

To change the order of raw materials in the Formulation Grid to match a desired order of addition in any Batch Tasks, select the row you'd like to move by clicking and dragging it to the desired position in the Formula Grid. 

Albert will always match the order in the formula grid with the order in a batch task. Changing the order of addition after a batch task has been created will not affect the batch task as the order is locked once the task is created.

Hide Unused Raw Materials in the Formula Grid

Albert allows you to hide unused raw materials on a formula by formula basis. This can be useful when you are managing a large number of raw materials in a project and only want to see a subset of the existing raw materials in a given formula or set of formulas.

To hide unused raw materials, navigate to the desired Formula and click on the filter icon to the right of the Formula ID. This will show only raw materials used in that Formula.

Click on additional Formula filters in your Formula Grid to see all raw materials used in the set of active formulas. 

To remove all active filters and return to the original, unfiltered view, click the Reset Filter button on the top righthand of your screen.

To remove individual filters, toggle the filter icon on the individual formula to exclude it from the filtered results. 

Delete Unused Raw Materials in the Formula Grid

Because the Formula Grid is connected to the Inventory, Albert allows you to delete any unused raw materials from your Formula Grid in the event that one or several raw materials are not being used in any formula for that specific Project. 

To do so, select the three dots next to the Add New button and select Remove Unused Inventory.

Confirmed the unused Inventory you want to delete and deselect the ones you'd like to keep in your Project.

Albert will then remove the selected raw materials that have not been used in a Formula.

Filtering the Formula Grid

The filters in the Formula Grid make it easy for you to find exactly what you are looking for when working with a large number of formulas. The Formula Grid can be filtered on Albert ID, Creator, Tags, and Inventory.