Automating User Sharing in AppSheet with GAS – Is This Feasible?

[Minami2914]

Hello,

We are currently developing an app using AppSheet and would like to share it with all employees in our organization. However, as our organization has 400 users, sharing the app individually using the "Share app" feature is extremely time-consuming. (We are on the Core plan of AppSheet.)

I learned that user registration might be automated by combining the AppSheet API with Google Apps Script (GAS). Is this approach feasible?

I understand that domain sharing is available with the Enterprise plan, but is there a way to achieve similar functionality on the Core plan? Such a feature would be incredibly helpful.

Thank you in advance for your guidance.

[AleksiAlkio]

As far as I know, sharing the app for your domain doesn't need Enterprise subscription. You can do it from here.. 

[Minami2914]

Thank you very much for your response.

I understand now that domain sharing is possible even on the Core plan, and with the Enterprise plan, sharing via mailing lists becomes available. I apologize for my misunderstanding.

With that in mind, would it be possible to achieve group sharing using the AppSheet API combined with Google Apps Script on the Core plan?

For instance, it would be incredibly helpful if we could reference a "Group List" table within the app to automatically add specified group members' email addresses for app sharing. Is such a workflow feasible?

[MultiTech]

The short answer is no unfortunately 😔

[AleksiAlkio]

One possible option would be..
- Share the app wth your domain
- Have a users table in the app
- Set access mode for all tables as "As app user"  
- As far as I remember, you should be able to trigger a script that share the Google Sheets for all emails that belongs to that group who should be able to use the app.

[Johan_Hurry]

Yes, it is possible to automate user registration using the AppSheet API combined with Google Apps Script, and while domain-wide sharing is only available on the Enterprise plan, there might be other workarounds to help streamline sharing on the Core plan.

[Minami2914]

Thank you for your response.

Domain sharing is indeed very convenient, but in our current situation, we need to create an app for only about 100 users within our organization of 400 people.

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As far as I remember, you should be able to trigger a script that shares the Google Sheets for all emails that belong to that group who should be able to use the app.

In this case, would it be possible to create a member list of the target 100 users in Google Sheets and use that data, combined with the AppSheet API and Google Apps Script, to automate the app-sharing process?

[Trevwiller]

IF you had a way to get all the emails on a Google doc. Each having its own line. Could copy and paste into that share app box. Would populate all the emails as separate users and could send out at once.

[Minami2914]

Thank you for your response.

However, as shown in the image, with the Core plan, I can only share the app with up to 20 users at a time. To overcome this limitation, I would like to create a system that allows me to register over 100 users at once by combining the AppSheet API and Google Apps Script (GAS).

If it is feasible to use GAS, I could set a trigger to run when the spreadsheet is edited. This way, simply updating the group list sheet would automate the app-sharing task for each group, which would be incredibly helpful.

Would such an approach be possible?

[AleksiAlkio]

What you can do:
#1 - Have one Google Sheet where one Sheet belongs to one app, next sheet to another app and so on. These are all your groups per app and this doesn't have anything to do with your app directly.
#2 - Share all apps with your domain
#3 - Create a script, that reads email adderesses from that "Groups" spreadsheet and share those individual Google Sheets what your apps are using one by one.
#4 - Set all tables with the access option as "As app user"

What this means.. your script is another process in the background and every time a new employee is added (or deleted) to your "Groups" spreadsheet, the script adds (removes) the share into that app specific spreadsheet. You need to share apps with your domain so your app users are first able to open the app. If the spreadsheet is not shared for these users, they are not able to use it. The biggest cons with this approach is.. you have now shared all spreadsheets your apps are using to your app users. Though you can restrict who can modify the data, but still they would be available to read the data. Not a nice approach, but doable.