Conditional formatting of a table based on header names

[Anonymous]

Hi

Does anyone have a bit of code that allows me to do something like this

if select table column header contains text "date" changed type "date".

Would be handy to stick this on the end of some of my queries rather than having to go through and select.

Regards

[BA_Pete]

Hi @Anonymous ,

I'm assuming you mean you want to be able to automatically perform functions on certain columns if they exist in the table.

Try this:

autoChangeTypes =
    if List.Contains(Table.ColumnNames(previousStepName), "columnToFindName")
    then Table.TransformColumnTypes(previousStepName,{{"columnToFindName", type text}})
    else previousStepName

Pete

[AlexisOlson · Accepted solution]

Think @Anonymous might mean something like this instead.

let
    [...],
    previousStepName = [...],
    dateCols = List.Select(Table.ColumnNames(previousStepName), each Text.Contains(Text.Lower(_), "date")),
    transformationsList = List.Transform(dateCols, each {_, type date}),
    autoDateType = Table.TransformColumnTypes(previousStepName, transformationsList)
in
    autoDateType

Or in one step:

autoDateType =
    Table.TransformColumnTypes(
        previousStepName,
        List.Transform(
            List.Select(
                Table.ColumnNames(previousStepName),
                each Text.Contains(Text.Lower(_), "date")
            ),
        each {_, type date}
        )
     )