Share a Google Form with the New "Publish" Feature

The previous "Send" button has been replaced by a new "Publish" button. It now controls who can see & respond to a Google Form as well as who can collaborate on a Google Form. This is only exhibited in new Forms that are created by scratch as by Forms that have been copied.

Winnie Milner
13 steps
54 seconds

Google Docs

Google Drive

Go to your Google Drive by navigating to <https://drive.google.com/drive/home>

Click the **"New"** button. Choose **Google Forms** from the dropdown options.

If you don't want to collaborate with someone else to create your Google Form, edit it as desired & then **Publish**. (See next slide.) If you want to work on the Form with at least one other person, create a new Form you will still need to click **Publish** so that you can start editing togther. Feel free to do that at any point in the process. (**Slide 6** will talk more about this.)

When you're ready to share it with others to: 1. allow people to see & respond to its questions OR 2. allow people to collaborate & edit, you must click **"Publish."** In other words, even though it may not be ready to allow others to respond to it, in order to allow others to edit the Form, you must **Publish** it first. Basically **Publish** is synonymous for **Share,** it doesn't necessarily mean that others can see it.

Determine who can see & respond to your Form questions or edit by clicking **"Manage."** Three sharing options: 1. Share to specific person 2. Editor View 3. Responder View will pop up. Let's start with **Editor View**.

The **Editor View** default is **Restricted**. When you click on the dropdown arrow, you can also choose our organization or anyone with the link. Chances are these options will rarely be used because (at least here at the WCCC) you wouldn't want to give so many people access to edit or share your Form. (More on that on **Slide 10.)**

The **Responder View** default is **Restricted**. When you click on the dropdown arrow, you can also choose our organization or anyone with the link. This is also where you remove viewing permissions. It is A LOT more likely to use these settings since viewers can't edit your Form, but only respond. These options are nice because they give you more control over who can see and respond to your Form. It can be wide open to everyone or just to people in an organization. This is a handy feature because the Form can be shared in a public forum like a publicly viewable website, but still disallow outside parties to answer its questions. While we previously had this ability, it's no longer buried in Form **Settings**.

Finally you can share access to answer or edit simply by typing someone's email address to the **"Add people, Groups & Calendar Events"** box. From there you can make them an editor, a responder and create an expiration (which also was a previously hidden setting.) After adding all desired names, messages & notifications, click **Send.** For even more control over sharing, click the **Gear** icon. (More on than on Slide 10.)

When you finish making your sharing decions, click **"Publish."** From now on, the previous **Publish** button will now say **Published.**

The **Gear** is where Form owners can regulate exactly what editors can do. Additionally it's where they control what Viewer & Commenters can do.

Once you have intially Published the Form, you can always make changes by clicking the **Published** button.

By clicking Published you can: 1. Toggle on and off whether it's accepting responses 2. Edit the **"Off"** Responder message. 3. Make changes to previous sharing decidsions or 4. Simply get the sharing link. (Keep in mind that you can get the share link and some people may not be able to "see or respond" depending on your previously set sharing decisions.

In conclusion, many of these sharing- related features were ones we previously had, but they were hard to find either buried in the **Skinny Snowman,** the **Responses Tab** or the **Settings Tab**. Now they are all located in one location, the **Publish** or **Published** button. All unmentioned Form settings are still located in the Settings tab.