Google-sheets – How to access all public files shared by one user in Google Drive

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Is it possible to access all public files in Google Drive if I have only one link? They are are obviously public as I can access the ones where I have a link, but I would like to obtain links to other public files.

Best Answer

I think that a specific user's public files would not be listed in an easily-accessible way due to privacy concerns. Understand that many users of Google Drive are not necessarily completely aware of all the items they've made public. Nevertheless, there are often situations when a user may want to make an item easily accessible to some people via a link (without going through the hassle of sharing it with their Google accounts), but still does not want that link to be common knowledge.

Users are expected to advertise or communicate the links for the items that they want to be accessed, by themselves. The more standard answer to your question would be to show you how to access a list of the files from other users that you've previously opened, as follows.

Please search, for example, owner:otheruser@gmail.com in the search bar at the top, where you need to replace the e-mail address with the account of the other user.

Note that searching -owner:me (with a negative sign in front) will show all items that you do not own (i.e. including items from everybody else).

You can do this in a more point-and-click way by clicking on the drop-down arrow to the right of the search bar, then clicking on the drop-down arrow next to "Owner":

Owner options

Then, to search for items owned by a specific person, click "Specific person..." and type in their e-mail address:

Search for items belonging to a specific person.

The search bar will then contain the code mentioned above.

These searches will also return items that you have not added to your Drive (i.e. which only exist in Shared with me).