# Does anyone use an entity diagram tool with Glide **URL:** \ **Category:** Ask for Help\ **Created:** [February 21, 2022, 4:22am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765 "2022-02-21T04:22:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Horns\_Illustrated](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/horns_illustrated/32/25077_2.png) [@Horns\_Illustrated](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Horns_Illustrated)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2022, 4:22am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/1 "2022-02-21T04:22:57Z")
Does anyone use an entity diagraming tool they might suggest to help with designing data and relationships before building out the app? Also, can relationships only be built between Glide tables/sheets or can I create a relationship ‘recipe’ in Google Sheets or between other sources? Thanks, Terry ---
**Author:** ![Killko](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/killko/32/39538_2.png) [@Killko](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Killko)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 12:16am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/2 "2022-02-22T00:16:11Z")
Not aware of any diagram in tool. But yes, you can use vlookup in Gsheet to mimic Glide lookups, but why ? ---
**Author:** ![nathanaelb](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/nathanaelb/32/43079_2.png) [@nathanaelb](https://community.glideapps.com/u/nathanaelb)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 12:35am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/3 "2022-02-22T00:35:34Z")
Hi Terry 👋 When you add sources to your Glide app, whether these are Glide tables or Google Sheets/Excel/Airtable/etc., these appear in the Glide Data Editor as additional tables. You can create relations between these tables, irrespective of the source. As Killko mentioned, you could also create “relations” directly within your sources. In Excel or Google Sheets for instance, this could be achieved with vlookup, index+match, possibly xlookup across sheets in the same spreasheet. In Airtable, with linked records across tables within your base. As for tools to create diagrams, I am unfamiliar with what an entity diagramming tool is, however I have used Miro and LucidChart, these might offer what you need to create diagrams. ---
**Author:** ![fluittsolutions](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/fluittsolutions/32/30155_2.png) [@fluittsolutions](https://community.glideapps.com/u/fluittsolutions)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 12:56am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/4 "2022-02-22T00:56:36Z")
Hi, As a non-IT person, I may be completely misunderstanding what you are asking. But when you say “diagram” and “design data and relationships before building,” I infer you may want to “see” the app outside of the limited visual that the Glide Data Editor provides. I was going crazy during my first build as I was learning Glide, so I created the chart below. It identifies my google sheets columns, Glide-specific columns/functions, relationships, arrays, look ups, computed columns, user-specific columns…_ **everything** _! Now I can truly see what I am building as well as brainstorm and solve problems. ![Glidelayout](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/uploads/glideapps/original/3X/e/2/e22a85d51f2a7495f9b134e14b5cf147f1ad64aa.png) ---
**Author:** ![nathanaelb](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/nathanaelb/32/43079_2.png) [@nathanaelb](https://community.glideapps.com/u/nathanaelb)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 1:08am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/5 "2022-02-22T01:08:50Z")
What a beautiful chart! How did you create the colored arrows, I would have no idea how to do that. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Horns\_Illustrated](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/horns_illustrated/32/25077_2.png) [@Horns\_Illustrated](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Horns_Illustrated)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 1:12am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/6 "2022-02-22T01:12:31Z")
I working through 1.) learning Glide, which is super simple, and 2.) trying to figure out how much I should include in the app. Diagraming it out first is like having a blueprint before you build it. @fluittsolutions - what did you use to create you diagram (ERD)? ---
**Author:** ![nathanaelb](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/nathanaelb/32/43079_2.png) [@nathanaelb](https://community.glideapps.com/u/nathanaelb)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 1:15am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/7 "2022-02-22T01:15:29Z")
Gotcha, diagramming makes a ton of sense. [Miro](https://miro.com/) [LucidChart](https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/) ---
**Author:** ![fluittsolutions](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/fluittsolutions/32/30155_2.png) [@fluittsolutions](https://community.glideapps.com/u/fluittsolutions)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 2:15am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/8 "2022-02-22T02:15:37Z")
It’s just MS Excel! ---
**Author:** ![fluittsolutions](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/fluittsolutions/32/30155_2.png) [@fluittsolutions](https://community.glideapps.com/u/fluittsolutions)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 2:22am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/9 "2022-02-22T02:22:18Z")
Basic Excel drawing tools. This is how your database looks in MS Access. Excel really is just a 2 dimensional simple database. The relationships make it a 3D database so I thought why don’t I just create the visual that Access uses behind its related tables. ---
**Author:** ![nathanaelb](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/nathanaelb/32/43079_2.png) [@nathanaelb](https://community.glideapps.com/u/nathanaelb)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 2:56am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/10 "2022-02-22T02:56:56Z")
Neat idea. I don’t use Excel, only Google Sheets. I’ll have to look around if drawing tools are available in GS. Thanks for the tip! ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Murphy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/darren_murphy/32/47326_2.png) [@Darren\_Murphy](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Darren_Murphy)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 3:00am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/11 "2022-02-22T03:00:46Z")
![Screen Shot 2022-02-22 at 10.59.50 AM](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/uploads/glideapps/original/3X/e/2/e2eed9b47c9050084e57bfb123ad020ab1c08ac5.png) ---
**Author:** ![david](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/david/32/62831_2.png) [@david](https://community.glideapps.com/u/david)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 4:10am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/12 "2022-02-22T04:10:37Z")
We use FigJam at Glide. ---
**Author:** ![Horns\_Illustrated](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/horns_illustrated/32/25077_2.png) [@Horns\_Illustrated](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Horns_Illustrated)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 4:55am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/13 "2022-02-22T04:55:49Z")
keep in simple…genius. Thank you for sharing that. ---
**Author:** ![Horns\_Illustrated](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/horns_illustrated/32/25077_2.png) [@Horns\_Illustrated](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Horns_Illustrated)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 5:01am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/14 "2022-02-22T05:01:27Z")
Thank you David for sharing that. I checked them out…ok, now I see. ---
**Author:** ![Killko](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/killko/32/39538_2.png) [@Killko](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Killko)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 9:03am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/15 "2022-02-22T09:03:31Z")
Hi @david are there any plans to incorporate a view of all the “screens” in an app showing how they’re linked/triggered by each other ? Glide is fantastically simple to use, but as soon as one starts building bigger apps, it gets difficult to understand the structure and flow, especially when one comes back to the app weeks or months later… Another issue is that while it’s easy to independently visualise and work on Tabs, many screens only appear for edit once you follow the logic in the app (ex. Detail, Form, Edit or New screens when clicking on a button or worse, triggered/created by an Action). It would be awesome, if all screens could be seen like Tabs on the left side of the development environment for easy editing or even cloning… The biggest issue I have is with Screens created say through a Show New Screen Action. I worked on some screens for hours, only to see that work vanish, because I decided to try some new Action flow. As far as I understand it, once one removes a Show New Screen Action, the screen one built for it, just disappears and can’t be recovered… But, keep up the amazing work, I love the simplicity and power of Glide! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Murphy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/darren_murphy/32/47326_2.png) [@Darren\_Murphy](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Darren_Murphy)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 9:26am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/16 "2022-02-22T09:26:21Z")
> [@Killko](#): > > Another issue is that while it’s easy to independently visualise and work on Tabs, many screens only appear for edit once you follow the logic in the app (ex. Detail, Form, Edit or New screens when clicking on a button or worse, triggered/created by an Action). One trick I have found that helps with this is to locate a column that you _know_ is referenced in that screen, do a Find all Uses on that column, and then you can navigate directly to the “hidden” screen. Actually, I’d have to say that Find all Uses is without a doubt the best feature that Glide have added in recent times in terms of helping developer productivity. It makes such a huge difference. No more making changes to a column, and then praying that you haven’t broken something in the process because you can’t remember where else in the app that column is referenced from. > [@Killko](#): > > The biggest issue I have is with Screens created say through a Show New Screen Action. > I worked on some screens for hours, only to see that work vanish, because I decided to try some new Action flow. As far as I understand it, once one removes a Show New Screen Action, the screen one built for it, just disappears and can’t be recovered… Agreed, this is a trap. I find that it’s generally a good practice to make a copy of such screens (or at least the component that the action is attached to) before messing too much with the actions. But, it would be nice if you didn’t have to remember to do that… ---
**Author:** ![Killko](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/killko/32/39538_2.png) [@Killko](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Killko)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 10:43am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/17 "2022-02-22T10:43:26Z")
> [@Darren\_Murphy](#): > > Actually, I’d have to say that Find all Uses is without a doubt the best feature that Glide have added in recent times in terms of helping developer productivity. It makes such a huge difference. No more making changes to a column, and then praying that you haven’t broken something in the process because you can’t remember where else in the app that column is referenced from. Yup, Find All Uses is a Life Saver especially when you encounter Sheets sync issues… ---
**Author:** ![system](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/system/32/53398_2.png) [@system](https://community.glideapps.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2022, 10:43am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/does-anyone-use-an-entity-diagram-tool-with-glide/38765/18 "2022-02-23T10:43:39Z")
This topic was automatically closed 24 hours after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.