Why bother using NOT(ISBLANK([KeyColumn])) instead of ISNOTBLANK([KeyColumn]) for View Ref actions ?

[Swoopy]

I've just found that the auto-generated expressions for all View Ref actions are NOT(ISBLANK([KeyColumn])) instead of ISNOTBLANK([KeyColumn]).

The NOT(ISBLANK([KeyColumn])) uses 2 expressions; NOT() and ISBLANK() ; that I believe takes more processing time than ISNOTBLANK() as only 1 expression. Beside, looks clumsy.

[MultiTech]

IsNotBlank() actually doesn't typically exist in other programming systems, isblank() does, and you just wrap it with not.

Many years ago Praveen got tired of having to correct formula syntax problems because somebody was forgetting to do the double closing parentheses, and introduced the combo.

[Swoopy]

Thanks. That's understandable but if we're talking about hundreds of thousands rows. An additional expression adds hundreds of thousands processing times. This should not have anything to do or to trade with somebody's heedlessness.

Don't forget that AppSheet apps are not blasting fast when they are dealing with huge tables. So, everything would count in that environment.

[MultiTech]

If I remember right it's just a masking; when it's processed I think it is processed as two things.

But I like where your mind's at! 🙂

[Steve]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure ISNOTBLANK(...) is just a macro for NOT(ISBLANK(...)).

[Swoopy]

Thanks for coming by.

In regard to this, is NOT(ISNOTBLANK("")) also another macro? I myself feel they are all programatically different inside AppSheet's internal complier machanism (may need to check with AppSheet's engineers).

Let's say they're in a same program module, at mostly least there must be a header to differentiate ISBLANK() ISNOTBLANK() NOT(ISBLANK()) NOT(ISNOTBLANK()) and each of them has its own code to process, let alone the NOT() itself which should be separately involved somehow.

I've replaced every NOT(ISBLANK(..)) with ISNOTBLANK(..) in an app having many View Ref actions auto-created by AppSheet (from 5 RDB tables). There are about 10,000+ rows put into the test. Believe it or not, the app seems sync faster considerably or it's just placebo.