Column arrangement in the Global Elements Manager is very important and making changes can have major impacts on the way your global elements publish across rundowns. It is important that both column quantity and the default column order match across all rundowns and Global Elements Manager.
There is no limit to the number of columns you can have in your Rundowns. Every Rundown can be unique in both its default column order and in the number of columns it contains, but, Global Elements requires consistency in both column order and quantity. Luckily, the majority of rundowns that share elements have the same structure. This consistency is what makes Global Elements possible.
If you add or delete a column in the Element Manager, you need to add or remove corresponding columns in your target Rundowns so that when you publish changes to your Global Elements, they correctly display in your Rundowns.
Best practices
The best practice for establishing the proper column structure is to go to your template rundown file (i.e. a rundown file that is constantly duplicated and used as the seed for future shows and events) and take note of how many columns it has to the right of Private Notes. Then go to Global Elements Manager and make sure Element Set 1 has the same amount of columns to the right of duration.
What is default column order?
A rundown's default column order is the order of it's columns for any user first entering the rundown. Since column order is something that can be customized per user, the column order that matters to Global Elements is the underlying original column order. Not necessarily the order your columns are currently in.
Can I set a new default column order?
Yes, but, you should be very careful when doing so. Resetting the default column order for a Rundown will not only affect the column order for every other user but it could also break the mapping of Global Elements that are currently in that rundown. Here is an article on resetting column order for a rundown.
What is an Element Set?
An Element Set is how we differentiate groups of Global Elements with different column quantities or column orders. By default all Element Sets contain 4 department columns - be sure to modify your elements sets to have as many department columns as your typical rundown.
What is a Department Column?
A department column is any column within a rundown that appear to the right of private notes. In GEM, the department columns are those that appear to the right of duration.