VirtualGiff's Back to School Top 7 Google Tips - Day 3 - Forcing People to Make a Copy of a File

Earlier this week, I decided to share one of my favourite tips every day for the seven days leading up to the new school year.  (See the full blog post here)  Here we go for day 3….

VirtualGiff’s Top 7 Google Tips

Note for Mac Users: When you see CTRL in this pot, use COMMAND instead - it will do the same thing.

I want to have someone to make a copy of a document into their Google Drive!

TIP #3- Force Cppy & Making Templates

Method 1: Force Copy

Change the end of your URL from /edit to /copy. For example:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sduCwQ-o95wcRKsClg2PkDJek1CgZr6B4Fz8HMAHutc/edit# becomes https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sduCwQ-o95wcRKsClg2PkDJek1CgZr6B4Fz8HMAHutc/copy.

You will get this:

Method 2: Making Templates

The more polite way (IMHO) is to change /edit to /template/preview (just like above).  I like this way better because instead of the blank screen just asking users to make a copy (of something they cannot see) it allows them to see the file they are making AND keep them name (no more “Copy of…”). To make the copy to their drive they just need to click the blue Use Template button at the top right.

You will get this:

Both of these work for Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, basically any of the Google Core Suite tools.