This page covers specific limitations and other important details to be aware of regarding a Quickbase sandbox.
Note: This feature is available for specific plans. Check the Quickbase Pricing page for a comparison.
Limitations
This section lists specific limitations of the sandbox feature.
General limitations
-
One sandbox per app: There can only be one sandbox at a time per live app. If you create a sandbox, nobody else can create another sandbox for that same app until you delete the existing sandbox.
-
App size: If your app contains 1GB or more data, your choices for including records in the sandbox may be affected. You may need to create a sandbox with partial or no data. You can examine app size by checking app statistics.
Unsupported features
A sandbox does not support tracking or publishing changes to:
-
Automations
-
Actions
-
Webhooks
Admin console reporting
Sandboxes are not included in the results when you use a connected table to access data from the Quickbase Admin Console.
Table-to-table imports
Importing data from other tables is disabled in a sandbox. Existing table-to-table import definitions are not visible in a sandbox and you can’t create new definitions.
Details
This section lists details about how a sandbox works with specific features and other areas within Quickbase.
API access
When using the Quickbase API with a sandbox:
-
The same authentication ticket you use for the live app works with the sandbox.
-
The sandbox and its tables have different Dbids than the live app.
-
In general, API calls that read data from the sandbox are supported. API calls that write data to the sandbox are not supported.
-
Validate all responses to API calls thoroughly; an API call that is denied because it is not possible in a sandbox may give a response not seen in any other situation.
-
API_CloneDatabase currently will not clone an app with the sandbox feature enabled, whether or not there is currently an active sandbox. If you need to clone an app with this API, you must disable the sandbox feature.
Application tokens
If the live app has an application token defined, this same application token works in a sandbox.
Changing an application token in a sandbox isn’t supported. To change an application token, you should disable the sandbox, change the application token, and then re-enable a sandbox.
Connected tables (Quickbase Sync)
-
If your app uses connected tables (also known as Quickbase Sync), scheduled refreshes only occur in the live app. Within the sandbox, you can still manually refresh data in by clicking the refresh button.
-
You can’t create a connected table with the source table originating from a sandbox. The source table needs to exist in the live app.
Formulas using AppId or Dbid
In a sandbox, note the values returned by the AppID or Dbid formula functions are IDs from the sandbox itself. These values don’t appear as tracked changes and don’t affect the live app when changes are published.
If your live app uses hard-coded AppID or Dbid values, upon creation the sandbox scans for these values and translates them to values that will work within the sandbox. These values are not tracked changes and don’t affect the live app when changes are published. The values are changed back to the live app IDs when sandbox changes are published.
If you create or edit a formula in a sandbox, you may include hard-coded references to the live app or the sandbox. Your hard-coded references to the live app will be published as-is, however, hard-coded references to the sandbox will be translated to the equivalent live app IDs when changes are published.
Modifying values in shared fields
Text and numeric fields can be set to use values from shared fields. For shared fields in the sandbox, any changes to values are data changes, not schema changes, so these updates are not tracked.
Reports
Common (shared) reports
For a sandbox-enabled app, creation or changes to common (shared) reports must be made in the sandbox and are tracked as changes. Common reports can’t be created in the live app.
Personal reports
Changes to personal reports should be made in the live app. Currently, it is possible to create or make changes to personal reports in the sandbox, but these changes are not tracked and won’t be published.
Roles that can save common reports
You can configure role permissions to allow any individual roles to save common reports in specific tables. Currently, this permission won’t work in a live app with the sandbox feature enabled. All common reports must be created or updated in a sandbox.
Sandbox visibility to other apps
In general, other apps will not be able to access sandboxes. Here are two examples:
-
When using the App Management feature Move a table into this app, sandboxes don’t appear in the list of apps from which you can move a table.
-
You can’t create a connected table with the source table originating from a sandbox. The source table needs to exist in the live app.