To include a link to a Google Sheet, you must first set the sheet’s sharing permissions so that it is either publicly visible or at least accessible to anyone who has the link. We recommend creating at least two separate resources for each Google Sheet: 1) a link to the sheet itself in the regular Google Drive interface; and 2) a direct-download link to an Excel or CSV version of the sheet, so that users can preview it in HDX. The version in HDX will update automatically as you make changes to the original Google Sheet.

To obtain the direct download link, select “Publish to the web…” from the “File” menu in Google Sheets, then in the dialog box that opens, under the ‘Link’ tab select your preferred file format (such as Excel or CSV), confirm, and Google Sheets will provide you the link. (Note that this process is not necessary simply for working with HXL-aware tools like Quick Charts, because they can open data directly from the regular Google Sheets link.)