WordPress is one of the most famous platforms in the world that allows users to publish content on their websites. Whether you use if for your personal web page or for a professional site, WordPress allows you to personalize your online page as you wish. You can even embed PDFs, spreadsheets and many other files in WordPress if you know how to do it.
If you’ve always wanted to embed PDFs, spreadsheets, PowerPoint slides, and other elements into your WordPress site, you will soon know how to do it fast and simple. The best way to do it is to use Google Doc Embedder; a plug-in that will allow you do all these operations. And even if it is a Google product, you don’t need an account to access and use the application. Simply open it with Google Docs viewer and you will be able to see all the files on your website.
Here is a step-by-step guide that will show you how to do it:
- The very first thing to do is to download and install the Google Doc Embedder Plugin. You can find it here. (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-document-embedder/)
- To install the plugin, go to the WordPress Admin Panel, and go to Plugins. Click the “Add New” button. You will get a window that will allow you to search for plugins. Make sure you type the “Google Doc Embedder” plugin name. You should be able to find it in the plugins list. Once you find the plugin, click on it and install it on your computer. A pop-up window will appear. Click the “OK” button and finish the installation. Make sure you click on the Activate the plugin button. You can configure the settings according to your needs.
- Once you finish the installation, you will see a new settings panel. You can find it under Settings – GDE Settings.
- This Google Doc Embedded Settings panel will allow you to customize the size, the position, the link behavior, and many more. You can customize the width and the height, decide if you want to show the download links to any users or just to the logged in ones, and control many other options. When you finish that, go back to the media uploader, and try to upload a new file. Choose a PDF file or an Excel document that you want to display on the website. The next step is to copy the Media File URL.
- Once you copy the URL of the file, open your post editor, and type the short code below:
1[gview file=”http://url.to/file.pdf“]
- In this code you can override any other elements, including the width= or the height=.
- That’s it! If you did everything correctly, as we showed you here, you should have a PDF or an Excel file embed in your WordPress post on your webpage. The file should even have a download link, if you have selected this option
- Do not confuse the Google Doc Embedder plugin with Google Docs. Many users do it, but it is a mistake. The plugin is used to display files hosted locally on any blog or website that cannot embed docs by itself.
- You can download the Google Doc Embedder here. (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-document-embedder/)
Conclusion
As you can see, downloading and installing the Google Doc Embedder is pretty simple, but it will allow you to embed PDFs, Excel files, PowerPoint slides, and many more in your WordPress posts. Make sure you follow our instructions, and you will find it very simple. Good luck!