Create a "validated" cell that activates hyperlinks

[WhiteKnight]

I have spreadsheets where there are a number of hyperlink buttons to web pages.

Obviously, I just click on any button to open the target in my browser.

Is it possible to create a trigger in a data validated cell that would present me with a drop-down list of all the hyperlinks and I just select/trigger the target I require?

I would envisage creating the hyperlinks in a “utility sheet” as a column of either text or button links and then simply identifying the contiguous array as the valid items and selecting the one required at that moment.

I’ve experimented with both text and button links, validating entries for an adjacent cell as the local array of three hyperlink cells.

Text link cells simply display and accept the text for valid entries and button link cells produce an empty validation list - rejecting the text on the button as invalid entries, thereby making the only valid entry “nothing”.

Many thanks in anticipation.

[Lupp]

It’s rather simple if you accept to need a simple additional step: After having selected the link (based on a name e.g.) click the functional link created following the selection in an adjacent cell to “activate” the URL.
See attached example: ask315672LinksByValidation.ods

If you insist on having the link “under the mouse pointer” the moment you selected its name, you will need user code, IMO.

[WhiteKnight]

Well, that’s introduced me to the mechanics of some interesting functions and provided an elegant solution for 90% of the desired functionality. The push-buttons would have been 100% but I guess I’ll survive.
Thanks

[Lupp]

The topic isn’t exactly simple.
There are very different means to provide “clickable links” in Calc. Linked text can occur in one or more portions in a cell, but the implementation is basically different from how it’s done in Writer.
Then there are ordinary shapes having assigned a hyperlink, and -in a different way- control elements can be linked. Then there is a (widely unknown) cell property usable to create linked cells, and also the HYPERLINK() function. (Fortunately CF doesn’t provide another way yet.)
For somebody trying to suggest a solution this is problematic, because it will always be incomplete and may just lead to the next question if not all the variants are handled.
Anyway: Validation can’t currently do it in one step.
Connecting some user code to a ListBox could help if the available URL are in advance collected in a CellRange.

[WhiteKnight]

Your “two-step” solution is already capable of optimising space on an active screen with more than two buttons AND facilitates placement of all links -for a multi-sheet file- on a dedicated URL sheet, with local cell validation selecting those appropriate to the job at hand.
I may even experiment with a “remote” hyperlink calc file for all URLs that could be activated by a single button on any sheet - then all hyperlinks are immediately available to all calc files.

Thanks for the inspiration - you should write a book:)).