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Is there a way to write a google apps script so when ran, a second browser window opens to www.google.com (or another site of my choice)?

I am trying to come up with a work-around to my previous question here: Can I add a hyperlink inside a message box of a Google Apps spreadsheet

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6 Answers 6

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This function opens a URL without requiring additional user interaction.

/** * Open a URL in a new tab. */ function openUrl( url ){ var html = HtmlService.createHtmlOutput('<html><script>' +'window.close = function(){window.setTimeout(function(){google.script.host.close()},9)};' +'var a = document.createElement("a"); a.href="'+url+'"; a.target="_blank";' +'if(document.createEvent){' +' var event=document.createEvent("MouseEvents");' +' if(navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase().indexOf("firefox")>-1){window.document.body.append(a)}' +' event.initEvent("click",true,true); a.dispatchEvent(event);' +'}else{ a.click() }' +'close();' +'</script>' // Offer URL as clickable link in case above code fails. +'<body style="word-break:break-word;font-family:sans-serif;">Failed to open automatically. <a href="'+url+'" target="_blank" onclick="window.close()">Click here to proceed</a>.</body>' +'<script>google.script.host.setHeight(40);google.script.host.setWidth(410)</script>' +'</html>') .setWidth( 90 ).setHeight( 1 ); SpreadsheetApp.getUi().showModalDialog( html, "Opening ..." ); }

This method works by creating a temporary dialog box, so it will not work in contexts where the UI service is not accessible, such as the script editor or a custom G Sheets formula.

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9 Comments

@MaxMakhrov indeed it does! I just updated the code with a fix. It appears programmatic clicks have long been problematic in Firefox, but now the script reliably shows the 'Failed to open' fallback in Firefox and offers the user a working link.
Stephen, i do not follow the above script. When i run it, it goes to an error page saying the URL was not found. Can you post up an example of a code that will open a site like google.com?
@PY_ you can pass any URL you want to the function. To open google.com, include the above script, then call openUrl( 'https://google.com' );
@PY_, I had same issue, you need to include http:// at beginning of urls, then it works
This suddenly stopped working for me. I noticed Brave was blocking popups. In the URL bar, I then chose "always allow popups and redirects from docs.google.com." But still it wouldn't work. I notice a console error "There was an error during the transport or process…this request. Error code = 10, Path = /wardeninit". I don't know what changed recently that is causing this problem.
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You can build a small UI that does the job like this :

function test(){ showURL("http://www.google.com") } // function showURL(href){ var app = UiApp.createApplication().setHeight(50).setWidth(200); app.setTitle("Show URL"); var link = app.createAnchor('open ', href).setId("link"); app.add(link); var doc = SpreadsheetApp.getActive(); doc.show(app); }

If you want to 'show' the URL, just change this line like this :

 var link = app.createAnchor(href, href).setId("link");

EDIT : link to a demo spreadsheet in read only because too many people keep writing unwanted things on it (just make a copy to use instead).

EDIT : UiApp was deprecated by Google on 11th Dec 2014, this method could break at any time and needs updating to use HTML service instead!

EDIT : below is an implementation using html service.

function testNew(){ showAnchor('Stackoverflow','http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/google-apps-script'); } function showAnchor(name,url) { var html = '<html><body><a href="'+url+'" target="blank" onclick="google.script.host.close()">'+name+'</a></body></html>'; var ui = HtmlService.createHtmlOutput(html) SpreadsheetApp.getUi().showModelessDialog(ui,"demo"); }
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6 Comments

see edit, I added a example spreadsheet to show you hor it should be used.
Sorry for the slow response. The example spreadsheet is in view only mode so it does not allow me to get to the script editor. But, for some reason, now the above scrip works. Thanks for the help!
Info: see also this other post: stackoverflow.com/questions/18151564/…
For those of you checking this out in the year 2018 or later, the above solution no longer works. Please see Stephen M Harris' answer. Works as of the date of writing this comment.
sorry but that is not true, the new version as EDIT works , it uses HTMLService.
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There really isn't a need to create a custom click event as suggested in the bountied answer or to show the url as suggested in the accepted answer.

window.open(url)1 does open web pages automatically without user interaction, provided pop- up blockers are disabled(as is the case with Stephen's answer)

openUrl.html

<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <base target="_blank"> <script> const url1 ='https://stackoverflow.com/a/54675103'; const winRef = window.open(url1); winRef ? google.script.host.close() : window.alert('Allow popup to redirect you to '+url1) ; window.onload=function(){document.getElementById('url').href = url1;} </script> </head> <body> Kindly allow pop ups</br> Or <a id='url'>Click here </a>to continue!!! </body> </html>

code.gs:

function modalUrl(){ SpreadsheetApp.getUi() .showModalDialog( HtmlService.createHtmlOutputFromFile('openUrl').setHeight(50), 'Opening StackOverflow' ) }
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2 Comments

Having <a target="_blank" and '_blank' as 2nd param of window.open helps avoiding the pop-up blocking. The page will be opened in a new tab. "_top" unfortunately doesn't work.
@Adamovskiy The base target is already set to _blank in the code.
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I liked @Stephen M. Harris's answer, and it worked for me until recently. I'm not sure why it stopped working.

What works for me now on 2021-09-01:

function openUrl( url ){ Logger.log('openUrl. url: ' + url); const html = `<html> <a id='url' href="${url}">Click here</a> <script> var winRef = window.open("${url}"); winRef ? google.script.host.close() : window.alert('Configure browser to allow popup to redirect you to ${url}') ; </script> </html>`; Logger.log('openUrl. html: ' + html); var htmlOutput = HtmlService.createHtmlOutput(html).setWidth( 250 ).setHeight( 300 ); Logger.log('openUrl. htmlOutput: ' + htmlOutput); SpreadsheetApp.getUi().showModalDialog( htmlOutput, `openUrl function in generic.gs is now opening a URL...` ); // https://developers.google.com/apps-script/reference/base/ui#showModalDialog(Object,String) Requires authorization with this scope: https://www.googleapis.com/auth/script.container.ui See https://developers.google.com/apps-script/concepts/scopes#setting_explicit_scopes }

https://developers.google.com/apps-script/reference/base/ui#showModalDialog(Object,String) Requires authorization with this scope: https://www.googleapis.com/auth/script.container.ui See https://developers.google.com/apps-script/concepts/scopes#setting_explicit_scopes

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4 Comments

Seems similar to my answer
How could this be modified to include data from cell A2 into the URL, e.g. to run a google search for the data in A2
It is working for me. This work around is excellent and very easy. The other solution does not work for me. Besides you have to create a new HTML file. If you create an HTML file i encountered "function not found error"
It looks like you copied this from somewhere else. If you're using someone else's work without giving them credit, that constitutes plagiarism, which is not welcome on Stack Exchange. To fix it, you can edit, include a link to the source, mention the author's name, and quote the copied content. For more details, see referencing help and this FAQ.
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Google Apps Script will not open automatically web pages, but it could be used to display a message with links, buttons that the user could click on them to open the desired web pages or even to use the Window object and methods like addEventListener() to open URLs.

It's worth to note that UiApp is now deprecated. From Class UiApp - Google Apps Script - Google Developers

Deprecated. The UI service was deprecated on December 11, 2014. To create user interfaces, use the HTML service instead.

The example in the HTML Service linked page is pretty simple,

Code.gs

// Use this code for Google Docs, Forms, or new Sheets. function onOpen() { SpreadsheetApp.getUi() // Or DocumentApp or FormApp. .createMenu('Dialog') .addItem('Open', 'openDialog') .addToUi(); } function openDialog() { var html = HtmlService.createHtmlOutputFromFile('index') .setSandboxMode(HtmlService.SandboxMode.IFRAME); SpreadsheetApp.getUi() // Or DocumentApp or FormApp. .showModalDialog(html, 'Dialog title'); }

A customized version of index.html to show two hyperlinks

<a href='http://stackoverflow.com' target='_blank'>Stack Overflow</a> <br/> <a href='http://meta.stackoverflow.com/' target='_blank'>Meta Stack Overflow</a>
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1 Comment

window.open(url, "_blank") can be used to open a web page.
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Building of off an earlier example, I think there is a cleaner way of doing this. Create an index.html file in your project and using Stephen's code from above, just convert it into an HTML doc.

<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <base target="_top"> <script> function onSuccess(url) { var a = document.createElement("a"); a.href = url; a.target = "_blank"; window.close = function () { window.setTimeout(function() { google.script.host.close(); }, 9); }; if (document.createEvent) { var event = document.createEvent("MouseEvents"); if (navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase().indexOf("firefox") > -1) { window.document.body.append(a); } event.initEvent("click", true, true); a.dispatchEvent(event); } else { a.click(); } close(); } function onFailure(url) { var div = document.getElementById('failureContent'); var link = '<a href="' + url + '" target="_blank">Process</a>'; div.innerHtml = "Failure to open automatically: " + link; } google.script.run.withSuccessHandler(onSuccess).withFailureHandler(onFailure).getUrl(); </script> <body> <div id="failureContent"></div> </body> <script> google.script.host.setHeight(40); google.script.host.setWidth(410); </script> </html>

Then, in your Code.gs script, you can have something like the following,

function getUrl() { return 'http://whatever.com'; } function openUrl() { var html = HtmlService.createHtmlOutputFromFile("index"); html.setWidth(90).setHeight(1); var ui = SpreadsheetApp.getUi().showModalDialog(html, "Opening ..." ); }
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4 Comments

I tried this example. It was working perfectly fine a few days back. Today when I am running it, it only opens the dialog but does not open the external url in a new tab. Is there some setting that has gone wrong in my browser?
@shanti Did you ever figure this out? It seems that something similarly stopped working for me suddenly: stackoverflow.com/questions/10744760/…
@Ryan Yeah it had something to do with my Chrome settings or some Chrome extension. I had to restore Chrome settings to their original defaults and it worked. I had set an answer also in this link: stackoverflow.com/questions/65265727/…
@shanti Thanks. I figured out a solution, too, which I mentioned in my comment there.

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