Google LLC’s G Suite customers are getting their hands on some important new capabilities today with the launch into general availability of a new Google Docs application programming interface.

The Google Docs API was announced at Google’s Cloud Next conference in Tokyo last year as a developer preview, and Google says it’s now ready for prime time.

The API is meant to help users more easily connect to the apps they use every day, allowing them to automate business processes by taking advantage of Docs’ real-time collaboration capabilities. Specifically, it helps keep work flowing between documents and apps, Google Product Manager Adam Tishok and Development Programs Engineer Anu Srivastava wrote in a blog post.

One way the API can help is by maintaining “consistency and accuracy” with essential business documents, Google said. For example, the Docs API makes it easier to generate invoices automatically. Employees can then programmatically add information such as new order numbers to those invoices, and then send them to clients automatically when a balance is due.

Google Docs API also allows documents from content management systems to be imported and exported to G Suite, enabling collaboration without leaving the system. Another option is to use the API to make programmatic edits to documents over time to minimize errors that may occur in them.

Google has also collaborated with a company called Zapier Inc. so G Suite users can create new documents easily from templates that incorporate custom workflows. “For example, if you’re an HR manager, you might use the same template for offer letters,” Tishok and Srivastava wrote. “Instead of manually populating information, you can use the Docs API to automatically populate details in an offer letter every time a candidate reaches the right stage.”

Analyst Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. said work environments such as G Suite need to get tooled up for new levels of productivity in order to help workers more efficient.

“Instrumenting documents is a promising strategy that Google is executing on with the Google Docs API,” Mueller said. “As with all changes to productivity tools, it comes back to convincing workers to adopt these new technologies.”

Google posted this video discussing the Docs API’s capabilities when it was first launched in preview last year:

Photo: Ryan Quick/Flickr