call an image from URL in Apps Script

Question

I programmed one that calls a Google Doc and in said Doc there is a variable called #Name# this is replaced by the name that is stored in a SpreadSheet.

My question is that to that Doc I want to add a variable called # Photo # and it is replaced by the photo stored in a Drive URL and this URL is in a SpreadSheet

How can I call that URL that is in Spreadsheet and be able to replace the field #photo#

With the name it does well with the function

body.replaceText ('#name#', name);

but with the image I don't know what to call it

For example, as other method, how about using Slides API? When the ReplaceAllShapesWithImageRequest of the batchUpdate method in Slides API is used, the image URL can be directly used as the replace image. Ref — Tanaike
Is the placeholder #PHOTO# part of a paragraph or another container element? — Iamblichus
@lamblichus It is a variable that will be replaced by the photo, this is found in a paragraph, I also have a tag called # Name # which is replaced by the name of the person stored in the spreadsheet, that I call it with the function: var name = sheet.getRange (i, 2) .getValue (); body.replaceText ('# name #', name); // update the temp doc — Robert Rodriguez
Is there other content in the paragraph? I'm thinking you could have a paragraph just for this (#PHOTO#). Otherwise, I don't think what you want to do is possible (either the whole paragraph will be replaced by the image, or the image will be appended just before or just after the paragraph, but not at the exact same location you want it. What do you think of this? — Iamblichus

Iamblichus Iamblichus · Accepted Answer · 2020-07-02T09:42:47

Since #Photo# is a paragraph of its own, you can do the following:

Using the Document Body, find the text #Photo# via findText(searchPattern) and get the Element that corresponds to this text via getElement().
Once you have retrieved this element, you can remove the text (#Photo#), since the element itself will exist even if the text is an empty string. You can use setText("") for that.
Get the Blob from the image URL via UrlFetchApp.fetch(url) and getBlob().
Get the retrieved element's parent, which is the paragraph #Photo# was part of, and use insertInlineImage to insert the retrieved image to the beginning of this paragraph.

Code sample:

function replaceTextWithImage() {
  var body = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody(); // Get current document's body
  var element = body.findText("#Photo#").getElement(); // Get element of #Photo#
  element.asText().setText(""); // Remove #Photo# placeholder
  var url = "YOUR_IMAGE_URL"; // Change this accordingly
  var blob = UrlFetchApp.fetch(url).getBlob(); // Get blob from image URL
  var image = element.getParent().asParagraph().insertInlineImage(0, blob); // Insert image
}

Notes:

I'm assuming that your question was only about inserting the image to the Document, not about the previous steps of populating the spreadsheet, retrieving the image URL, etc.
This sample refers to a script that is bound to the Google Doc (hence, it's using getActiveDocument() to retrieve the Doc). If that's not the case, you should retrieve the document via openById(id) or openByUrl(url).

call an image from URL in Apps Script

1 Answers

Code sample:

Notes: