Embedded Files
The holiday season is approaching and you likely have big festivities to organize. Nothing better than creating groups to invite and share greeting cards with! This is also the season of one of the most frequently asked questions: "Who is in that group?"
Groups are old and so powerful they have the potential to bring down the service. Google walks a fine line between empowering users and protecting us from unnecessary emails and even unwanted disclosures. So how do you get to look inside of groups? Here are two methods you can use to help yourself.
Disclosing groups can have grave consequences
Method 1: Google Groups
Method 1: Google Groups
Go to groups.google.com and search for the group. Attention! The group interface mixes searching for groups and searching for messages. Make sure you click on "Home" or "My groups" first, so that the search box says Search for groups or messages before you search.
Depending on the group, several things may happen:
Always go to "My groups" to make sure you search groups AND messages.
1A: Best case: It is your group
1A: Best case: It is your group
Being able to manage the group will give you what you want. Just go into "Management" mode (below). You'll see something called Members > All members which will allow you to see and even export members to CSV (which you can import into Sheets).
Attention! In some cases, the emails of some (or all) members will still be hidden. Nothing you can do.
Attention! Your group may consist of subgroups. You will have to look these up separately.
This screen (and this button) is every event manager's delight.
1B: Normal case: You can see the members
1B: Normal case: You can see the members
If you see the screen below, click on View the list of members. You will see a list of names (not email addresses), but will not be able to export.
Pro-tip: this view is caused the person having insufficient permissions, set by the manager in Manage > Permissions > Access permissions > View Topics.
1C: Worst case: Members are hidden
1C: Worst case: Members are hidden
You are out of luck. This group must be really special.
Pro-tip: this view is caused the person having insufficient permissions, set by the manager in Manage > Permissions > Access permissions > View Members.
Method 2: Calendar
Method 2: Calendar
Go to Calendar, create an invite and add the group. If you just want to know names, you can now expand the group (1) and its subgroups (3). The "expand" button (2) will expand all groups at once and flatten the group, meaning it will look as though you had invited all people individually. A time-saver when working with heavily nested groups. If you just want names, you can stop here and discard your drafted event. Attention! This works only if you are allowed to see group members (see "worst case" above).
If you want email addresses, you will need to actually invite the group. Make sure you don't cause confusion: Set the invite in the past (like a month ago) so people will not accidentally see it. When Calendar asks you to send invitation emails, answer Don't send.
Open the event, hover over the the guest list and get copy the guest list. For some people, this was the single most important new feature the recent Calendar update brought.
Cleanup! Delete the event - again not sending updates. As if it never happened.
Attention! External people will always get invites, regardless of what you click, you don't want to use this method with a group you knows contains external people. This is where your knowledge about Calendar fields comes in handy.
Attention! This will only work for groups of up to 200 people. Above that, the "big event mode" is triggered and only the organizer can see invitees, via button to export to Sheets.
Method 3: Open a ticket
Method 3: Open a ticket
Your territory Service Desk will help you out when you can't access a group. They have admin privileges and super powers precisely for that.
You would not.
Hooray!
I hope group management got a little bit less daunting. It is important to know what you are doing and who you are talking to, but Google must respect both its infrastructure (anti-spam) and the privacy of those users who wish to keep certain groups private. You hopefully appreciate that trade-off a bit better. Thank you for reading!
Page updated
Report abuse