Appending File Upload Data from Forms to a Single Excel cell

[MikeBurton2000]

Hi. Please let me start with announcing that I'm a newbie to this Power Automate malarky so bear with me if my terminology is not fully on point. I have created a form in Forms to which responders can attach up to 5 files on a single question. I have successfully created the flow (with the help of many posts in this and other forums) that gets the form info and pops it neatly into an Excel file. It then creates an email to the appropriate person depending on the choices made in another question and inserts a link to the attached file in the HTML body of the email.  Now this all works splendidly - until you attach more than one file.

The issue is that with multiple files attached to the form question I get one line for each attachment in the Excel file. What I really want is all the links in one cell on one line. So I looked at info on forums etc and found one entitled "Working with Files on MS Forms in MS Power Automate" by By The Devs that looked very promising but I hit another snag.

My flow looks like this...

 as per the info I have been able to collect this far I have created a Variable Array (CSUpload) and have the filename data being appended to it. One thing I have found is that in the examples I have been viewing (most of these are appending the upload data to and Attachments Variable for sending in an email) it appears that when I get to the point where I wish to send the contents of the variable as the attachment or in my case as a line in my excel, I should see my CSUpload variable as an option in the Dynamic Content list. But I don't have it as an option.

As it stands, my flow does work, but adds a line for each attachment in the form. I would be really happy if someone could help me understand where I am going astray.

Many Thanks

[MikeBurton2000]

I should also say I have moved the ADD A ROW INTO A TABLE step outside of the APPLY TO EACH step with no change in result.

[v-bacao-msft · Accepted solution]

Hi @MikeBurton2000 ,

What do you want to insert in the Upload field?

If it is the data in the array variable, then the Add row into a table action needs to be configured outside of Apply to each.

Then you need to configure the variable in this field instead of name. If you can't get the Dynamic content of the variable, you can directly use expression to get it, like: variable('variableName')

Best Regards,

[MikeBurton2000]

Thank you very much for the pointer. I had already moved the Add Row To Excel out into a new step. So now following your guidance I have typed in the expression to get the CSUpload Variable into the relevant cell in the excel table. This is now working a treat with the other adjustments I made. The correct cell in my table now gives me the data as follows:

["https://ThePathToMyOneDriveLocation/Documents/Apps/Microsoft%20Forms/CS%20Issues%20Feedback/CS%20Feedback%20Uploads/TestImage1.png","https://ThePathToMyOneDriveLocation/Documents/Apps/Microsoft%20Forms/CS%20Issues%20Feedback/CS%20Feedback%20Uploads/TestImage2.png"]  

So this is great progress and almost exactly what I need. The next part of my quest is to remove the opening [" and the closing "] after each link. Can you advise how best to achieve this so the cell contains only nice clean hyperlinks such as:

https://ThePathToMyOneDriveLocation/Documents/Apps/Microsoft%20Forms/CS%20Issues%20Feedback/CS%20Feedback%20Uploads/TestImage1.png;  https://ThePathToMyOneDriveLocation/Documents/Apps/Microsoft%20Forms/CS%20Issues%20Feedback/CS%20Feedback%20Uploads/TestImage2.png

I am assuming separating the links with a semicolon is acceptable and will allow each link to function correctly?

Many thanks again for your kind help.

Mike

[v-bacao-msft · Accepted solution]

Hi @MikeBurton2000 ,

You could try this configuration:

Best Regards,

[MikeBurton2000]

Good Morning and many thanks for your suggestion. Your solution looks so simple - obviously a bit like me 😉

I took your information and added it exactly as you recommended, and at first, I didn't get what I was looking for - in fact it made no difference. However, your information forced me to think a little harder as to why it did not work as it seemed logical that it should.

I took your information and then changed the dynamic content of the Upload Cell in the ADD ROW INTO TABLE from "CSUpload" to "Output". After a test I saw progress was being made and the non required characters were now gone. I then went back and changed the JOIN WITH from " ;" to " ;'Enter'" (The ENTER key not the text) and this now gives me the information exactly as I wanted it. Each link is displayed without the " [ ] and is now placed on a new line ending with ;

So your suggestion has helped me to resolved two issues.

Once again, many thanks to everyone for their help.