Google-docs – Why does Google document lock itself

I've found no direct way of opening a created document through Google Apps Script (GAS), via GAS. There's however an indirect way, which is presented below. It uses an Anchor element to show a pre-formatted hyperlink.

Code

// global
var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActive();

function onOpen() {
  var menu = [{name: "Create Document", functionName: "createDoc"}];
  ss.addMenu("Extra", menu);
}

function createDoc() {
  var sh = ss.getActiveSheet(), aRow = sh.getActiveCell().getRowIndex();
  var title = sh.getRange(aRow, 1).getValue(), docDate = new Date(); 
  var docTitle = title + "-" + docDate, doc = DocumentApp.create(docTitle);
  var url = doc.getUrl();

  // create app and panel
  var app = UiApp.createApplication().setTitle("Open Google Document")
    .setHeight(50).setWidth(400);
  var vPanel = app.createVerticalPanel()
    .add(app.createAnchor(docTitle, url));

  // add to app
  app.add(vPanel);
  ss.show(app);  
}

Screenshot

Remarks

This piece of code creates a new menu entry called "Extra" upon opening of the file. The selection "Create Document" will create (in the back gound) a Google Document and displays a panel with a hyperlink to open the document.

Example

I've created an example file for you: How To Open Document

I'm afraid that this isn't possible. (At least, not right now.)

A quick perusal of the Google Drive support forums shows other people also wanting to have more dynamic mailto: links in their Google Documents. (Surprisingly, this might be easier to do with Google Spreadsheets and the =hyperlink() function.)

Anyway, I did some experimentation.

A mailto: link with one Email address will work.

mailto:bigal@example.com

However, it has to be an email address. Using a name (so that Outlook will search for it in your address book) doesn't work.

I also tried a couple of other tricks to get multiple addresses in the link.

mailto:bigal@example.com?cc=littlejohn@example.com

That doesn't work. Nor did separating email addresses with commas instead of semi-colons, so that's not an issue.

So, it appears that in a Google Document you're limited to the very simplest mailto: link.

Assuming you're "locked in" to the Google eco-system, your options at this point are to either put email addresses into the document as plain text (so people can copy-paste directly to their email client compose window) or create an email alias for each group of people who should receive email messages from a document. (That last is certainly impractical for even small shops.)