Chrome, HTML5, JavaScript, webdev

Google App Script Session

On the second day of the JPR12 we had a good coding dojo (which is a meeting where a bunch of coders get together to work on a programming challenge) during the afternoon activities on Google App Script. The idea was to create a simple, yet functional, system to organize an event. The event could be a training day, hackathon, birthday party, running race, etc’. We started with a template site I’ve created that is built on top of twitter bootstrap-responsive and modernizr (but of course).

The site gives you basic functions like:

  • What  – What is the event goal/mission or why should I come.
  • Where – Information on the venue and where to park. We use some nice custom google map in order to follow the rule: “one picture is worth 10,000 words”.
  • Contact – Who is running the event and ways to get in touch.
  • Registration – Using Google forms and app script, as our backend, we will have a system to keep track on the registration process.
In the system backend code we got:
  • Set up the maximum number of people that could participate in this event.
  • Send a confirmation email.
  • Send a waiting-list email to the ones that are filling the registration form after the maximum number of participate is being reach.
  • Send a reminder email (a week and/or a day) before the event.
  • Lastly, after the event, send an email with a link to a feedback form. We want to be able to improve…
The two interesting parts of this system are:
  1. Simple one page app that will render nicely on phones, tablets and desktops.
  2. Backend that let us run the communication with the participates and keep tracks on the registration process.
Ready to see some (simple) code?
Here is the part that we use in #2:


//
// Call this when you want to send the call 
// for Feedback email AFTER the event is done
//
function sendFeedbackEmail() {
  // Get our main spread sheet into ss obj.
  var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();

  // Fetch the sheet with the list of emails
  var dataSheet = ss.getSheetByName("Registration");

  // Fetch the range the contain our information for the email
  var dataRange = dataSheet.getRange(2, 2, 
      dataSheet.getMaxRows() - 1, 
      NUM_FORM_QUESTIONS + 1);

  // First row of data to process
  var startRow  = 2;  

  // Get the email template (you may use html template here)
  var templateSheet = ss.getSheetByName("Email Templates");
  var emailTemplate = templateSheet.getRange("A5").getValue();
  
  // Create one JavaScript object per row of data.
  objects = getRowsData(dataSheet, dataRange);

  // For every row object, create a personalized email from a template and send
  // it to the appropriate person.
  for (var i = 0; i < objects.length; ++i) {

    // Get a row object
    var rowData = objects[i];

    // Only contact people who are 'yes' status
    if (rowData.status == YES) {  

      // Generate a personalized email.
      // Given a template string, replace markers (for instance ${"First Name"}) with
      // the corresponding value in a row object (for instance rowData.firstName).
      var emailText = fillInTemplateFromObject(emailTemplate, rowData);
      var emailSubject = dataSheet.getRange("P2").getValue() + " Reminder";
      
      MailApp.sendEmail(rowData.emailAddress, emailSubject, emailText);
      
      // Make sure the cell is updated right away in case the script is interrupted
      SpreadsheetApp.flush();
    }
  } 
}

Here is the full code for the event site: https://github.com/greenido/events-site-template please feel free to fork, pull and do something cool with it. For more details on the new options and capabilities in Google App Script: https://developers.google.com/apps-script/templates

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