Using Visualization Gadgets

Google Visualization API gadgets are gadgets that can access data sources in an easy manner. For developers this means writing an application only once to be reused over multiple data sources. For users, this means enjoying a wealth of new visualization options over many types of data sources.

Data Sources that Support Visualization Gadgets

Curently Google Spreadsheets supports visualization gadgets.

Using Visualization Gadgets

Visualization gadgets read data from a data source, and display this data in a useful way. The data source is typically configured in a gadget as a URL in a gadget preference called data source URL.

Starting from Google Spreadsheets

1. Select 'Insert' and 'Gadget' from the spreadsheet toolbar.
2. Select a gadget from the list.
3. Select the range of cells you want to display in the gadget. Optionally, configure the gadget preferences.

Starting from iGoogle

Visualization gadgets will prompt you to fill in a data source URL. Data source URLs are provided by applications that support the Google Visualization API. For example, to get the data source URL from a Google Spreadsheet, do the following:

1. Open a spreadsheet.
2. Insert a gadget, select the range of cell you want to read.
3. In the gadget title, click the arrow icon on top right.
4. select 'get query data-source URL' from the popup menu.
5. Copy-paste the URL into the 'data-source URL' gadget preference.