Using Google Docs from web app

Question

Hi,

We have a requirement for people to be able to look at documents people have uploaded to us (mainly word, possibly some rtf) via our web app. We want the user to be able to open the docs inside the browser, but keep the original formatting and not have the need for another application (like word, acrobat etc).

We thought about using google docs to do this, there appears to be some batch uploading options to get stuff in there but does anyone know if we can use the API's to keep the user on our site without them having to login to google docs themselves, and keep them still on our website with re-directing to google docs to view them.

Cheers

Answer 1

There's an option to make documents public (Somewhere in Share->Advanced Options).

Using api you can get list of documents in your google docs account, you can even search em. In your app you could make a link to the document in google docs which opens in a new window. That way your user will never navigate away from your page. An alternative would be to use an IFrame, but it's considered bad practice.

A completely different approach could be to automatically generate and host a pdf each time someone uploads a file. There are scripts/programs which can do that, just call them after you receive a file.