gDoc the Home Screen

Open a gDoc file from your iPhone Home Screen by creating an html file that forwards to your doc using the docs url schema.

I wanted to have a one click way of accessing my daily check in doc from my phone — the problem is Google Docs doesn’t let you save to the Home Screen and editing the doc in Safari doesn’t work. Yes I could simply keep the Docs app on my Home Screen but if the doc wasn’t edited recently it’s tricky to get to. So here the solution: I created a one line html file that forwards to the doc using the docs app url schema:

<META http-equiv=”refresh”content=”0; url=googledocs://docs.google.com/document/d/1urfGBxbm548CR0fju1xAssN4gjdbAcqrtvR4sGSK1kY/;”>

To make things a bit more user friendly I added a title and icon. I know I left out all the other (superfluous) html :)

<title>Example Doc</title>
<link rel=”apple-touch-icon” href=”icon.png”>

You can test it docs-homescreen (from your ios mobile device). You can also download the file here and customize it. Then upload and visit it with Safari, you’ll be prompted to open Google Docs. Hit Cancel, and save that Url to your Home Screen. Now when you click on your newly created Home Screen icon (click), it will ask you to open Google Docs (click), and tadaa you’re in your doc. Two clicks!

This article originally appeared here.