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Google Sheets No-Code Database

Tutorial
Tutorial

In this hands-on portion of this guide, you will build an application to update Google Sheets periodically with an external API using no-code tools.

Getting news data with News API

In ths step you will regiser for a News API account. We will use news data to update a Google Sheets spreadsheet.

Go to

https://newsapi.org/register⁠

and register for a free account. You will now be able to search for various news and topics

Let’s say you want to search for news about Telsa. You can run the following directly in a browser (don’t forget to set your API key):

⁠

https://newsapi.org/v2/everything?q=tesla&pageSize=10&sortBy=popularity&apiKey=your_api_key⁠

⁠

Service response is (with pageSize=1 to minimize response):

{

"status":"ok",

"totalResults":17281,

"articles":[

{

"source":{

"id":"engadget",

"name":"Engadget"

"author":"https://www.engadget.com/about/editors/mariella-moon",

"title":"Tesla's Powerwall+ is a higher-power battery for off-grid living",

"description":"Tesla has started sending potential customers information about an upgraded Powerwall that's aptly called Powerwall+.",

"url":"https://www.engadget.com/tesla-powerwall-plus-battery-specs-154450905.html",

"urlToImage":"https://s.yimg.com/os/creatr-uploaded-images/2021-05/4f99d160-aa48-11eb-bfe3-731c9a361946",

"publishedAt":"2021-05-01T15:44:50Z",

"content":"It looks like Tesla has started sending potential customers information about an upgraded Powerwall that's aptly called Powerwall+. In a post on Reddit spotted by Electrek, a user posted a spec sheet… [+1785 chars]"

}

]

}

Next we are going to use Parabola to build an automation - to pull data from this service and send it to Google Sheets.

Automation and integration with Parabola

Parabola is an automation and integration platform. With Parabola you will be able to schedule when to get data from an API, format the data and send it to Google Sheets.

Creating a new flow

In this step you will register for a Parabola account and create a new flow.

Go to

http://parabola.io⁠

to register for a new account

From the dashbord, click Add a new flow. This is how a new flow looks:

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 3.22.17 PM.png

⁠

Pulling data from API

In this step you will pull data from an external news API.

In the right-hand panel search for api

Drag and drop into the circle Pull from API step. You just added a step to call an external API

Double-click on the step to open its settings

Copy API URL (from above) into API Endpoint URL field (don’t forget the API key)

Click Show updated results button to invoke the API. You should see the results on the right-hands side. There is one extra step we need to do to put the result into a table format

Open JSON Response section

For Top Level Key choose articles

Click Refresh data button. You should now see response from the API in table format. Your result should look like this:

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 3.55.26 PM.png

⁠

In the next step we will send data to Google Sheets spreadsheet.

Sending data to Google Sheets

In this step we will send data to Google Sheets.

On the right-hands side, search for Google Sheets. Select Send to Google Sheets and drag it to the right of Pull from API step. A connection will be automatically created

Double-click on Send to Google Sheets step to configure it

First you need to authorize Parabola to access Google Sheets. Click on Authorize Google Sheets button. Follow the steps to allow access

Once access is allowed, next you need to choose a Google Sheets document. You can create a new file or choose an existing one

For Export Rule choose Overwrite Sheet

Click Show updated result. On the right-hand side you will see data that will be exported to Google Sheets

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 4.09.09 PM.png

⁠

That’s all. The next step is to test the flow.

The finished flow looks like this:

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 4.12.12 PM.png

⁠

Running the flow

In this step you are going to test the flow.

Click Run Flow button to run the flow. Parabola will switch to a Live view that looks like this:

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 4.14.38 PM.png

⁠

Go to Google Sheets and open the spreadsheet to see the exported data. It should look like this (your data will be slightly different):

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 4.16.12 PM.png

⁠

You can run the flow again but it’s likely the data will stay the same. A quick way to see how the data is updated is to change the search topic.

Switch back to Editor view

Open Pull from API step

Under URL Parameters, change the q value to something else, for example Apple

Click Show updated results

Close this step

Click Update Live Version to publish the update

Click Run Flow Now button

Go back to Google Sheets, you will now see news about Apple

Giving the flow a name

Right now our flow is named untitled. Let’s give it a real name

Switch to Settings view

For Flow Name enter Awesome News Update or anything else you prefer

Click Save

The last step is to sdchedule this flow to run daily.

Scheduling the flow to run daily

In this step we will schedule the flow to run periodically.

From the Live view, find Scheduling Rules section

Click +add rule button

Set how often you would like the flow to run automatically. If you want to give it a try, you can set it to run every 10 minutes for example

⁠

Screen Shot 2021-05-11 at 4.26.45 PM.png

⁠

Click Save Rule

This flow will now automatically run every day at 8am PT. When the flow runs, news data will be retrieved from the News API service and sent to Google Sheets.