How to link a Google Doc to an InDesign text frame

Updated 15 September 20263 min read

1. Sign in and add the Doc

1. Open the DriveSync panel and go to the Files tab.
2. Press Sign in with Google. Your browser opens; approve access once, and DriveSync stays signed in from then on.
3. Press Add Docs or Sheets… and choose the Doc from the list that opens in your browser.DriveSync can only open files you choose here. It never sees the rest of your Drive.

The Doc now appears on the Connected tab.

2. Put it in a frame: the quick way

1. In InDesign, select the text frame the copy should flow into.
2. On the Connected tab, press Place here on the Doc’s row.

DriveSync gives the frame a label, links the Doc to it and syncs, all in one step. The words arrive in your frame, and the frame’s size and position don’t change.

Nothing selected? What Place here does then is set on the Settings tab, under “Place here” with nothing selected: load InDesign’s place cursor so you drag out the frame yourself, or draw a frame at the page margins for you.

3. Or label the frame yourself

DriveSync matches a Doc to a frame by the frame’s script label, the same label you’d see in Window ▸ Utilities ▸ Script Label. Labelling by hand is handy when you’re preparing a template.

1. Select the text frame.
2. On the Frames tab, type a label such as feature-intro and press Apply.
3. On the Connected tab, type the same label into the Doc’s frame script label box.
4. Press Sync on that row.

If the frame you select already has a label, DriveSync keeps it and links the Doc to that label rather than renaming your frame.

4. Save the document

Labels and the list of connected files are stored inside the .indd. Save the document after connecting files, and the connections survive Save As, renaming and moving the file.

A colleague who opens the same document sees the same connections. To sync, they sign in with their own Google account. Google grants access per person and per file, so if a sync can’t open the Doc for them, they add it once with Add Docs or Sheets….

Label a template once

Because labels live in the document, you can label a template’s frames — headline, standfirst, body — and save it as an InDesign template (.indt). Every document made from it arrives ready: connect the new Docs, give each one its matching label, and sync.

If the sync can’t find the frame

“No frame has the script label …”

The label on the Doc’s row doesn’t match any frame. Select the frame, go to the Frames tab and press Apply with that label, or correct the spelling on the row.

The copy doesn’t all fit

DriveSync never resizes your layout. Enlarge the frame or thread it to another one, as you would with any overset text.

You’re not sure which frame a Doc feeds

Press Find frame on the Doc’s row and InDesign selects it for you.

Everything DriveSync does, including warnings, is listed in the Activity log on the Files tab.