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Weekly

Get a weekly email summary of your edited Google Docs

Every Friday you get one email summarising what changed in your Google Docs this week, with the action items pulled out.

Runs
Weekly
Apps
Gmail, Google Docs
AI
Yes, uses the built-in AI allowance
Access
Docs read; Gmail gmail.send

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: every Friday, summarise the Google Docs edited this week in my Notes folder and email me the key points and actions.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

A team lead keeps meeting notes, project plans and one-to-one notes in a shared Google Drive folder. During the week several people edit them, and action items written in a doc on Tuesday are forgotten by Thursday. Reopening every document on Friday to see what changed takes longer than anyone has.

This automation looks at the docs in your folder that were edited during the week, has AI summarise each one and pull out the tasks, and sends you a single email on Friday. You start the next week knowing what moved and what you owe.

What you get out of it

  • Action items do not get lost

    Tasks buried in the middle of notes are pulled out and listed together. You can copy them into your task list in a minute instead of hunting through documents.

  • One read instead of many

    A short summary per document replaces opening each one. You see quickly which docs need a closer look and which only had small edits.

  • A natural weekly review

    Friday's email is a ready agenda for reviewing the week. It works as a prompt to close loops before the weekend.

  • Covers what others changed too

    Edits by colleagues in shared docs are included. You notice new decisions or questions even when nobody told you about them.

How it works

What happens, step by step

  1. Every Friday, ClickRuntime finds the Google Docs in your folder that were edited in the past week.

  2. It reads the text of each one.

  3. AI writes a short summary of each document and lists any action items.

  4. You receive one email with all the summaries and actions.

Before it runs live

  • Connect Google through your own Google app (a one-time, 10-minute setup), so it works with your own Gmail
  • Connect Google Docs

What you get

RunsWeekly
Get a weekly email summary of your edited Google Docstoday, 9:00Succeeded
Email · Weekly docs digestContoso launch plan: dates moved to 14 Nov. Actions: confirm venue (Ops), send press list (Marketing).

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.
  • Your own rules

    Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.

  • Any number of apps

    One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.

  • AI where it helps

    Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.

  • On a schedule or on each event

    Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

  • Run it at a different time, more or less often, or only on weekdays
  • Change what the AI looks for, or how it writes the result
  • Add another app, for example also send it to Slack
  • Combine it with other Gmail and Google Docs steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.
weekly_digest_of_updated_docs_by_email.pyexample
from datetime import datetime, timedelta, timezone
from google.oauth2.credentials import Credentials
from googleapiclient.discovery import build
from clickruntime import on_trigger, credentials, ai, notify

FOLDER_ID = "your-folder-id"

@on_trigger
def run(event):
    creds = Credentials(credentials.connection("google", "work"))
    since = (datetime.now(timezone.utc) - timedelta(days=7)).strftime("%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S")
    files = build("drive", "v3", credentials=creds, cache_discovery=False).files().list(
        q=f"'{FOLDER_ID}' in parents and mimeType='application/vnd.google-apps.document' and modifiedTime > '{since}'",
        fields="files(id,name,modifiedTime)").execute().get("files", [])
    if not files:
        return {"docs": 0}
    docs = build("docs", "v1", credentials=creds, cache_discovery=False).documents()
    parts = []
    for f in files[:15]:
        body = docs.get(documentId=f["id"]).execute()["body"]["content"]
        text = "".join(r["textRun"]["content"] for c in body for r in c.get("paragraph", {}).get("elements", []) if "textRun" in r)
        parts.append(f"## {f['name']}\n{text[:3000]}")
    try:
        digest = ai.generate("\n\n".join(parts), system="For each document give a 2-line summary, then list all action items with owners.", max_output_tokens=1500).text
    except ai.AIError:
        digest = "Edited this week:\n" + "\n".join(f["name"] for f in files)
    notify.email_me("Weekly docs digest", digest)
    return {"docs": len(files)}

FAQ

Common questions

Which documents are included?
Google Docs in the chosen folder whose last edit falls within the past seven days. Docs that were not touched are left out.
Can it send the digest to my team instead?
The digest goes to your own address. You can forward it, or point the summary at a shared channel instead if the team prefers that.
Will very long documents be summarised fully?
Long documents are trimmed to their first part before summarising, which covers most notes. Very long reports may need a separate, dedicated summary.
What permissions does it need?
Docs read; Gmail gmail.send. Nothing else in your accounts is used.
Does it need AI?
Yes. It uses ClickRuntime's built-in AI, so you don't need an OpenAI or Anthropic key. Every plan includes a monthly AI allowance.
How many runs does it use?
One run each time it runs (weekly). Checks that find nothing to do and stop right away aren't counted.
Can I change how it works?
Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Set up “Get a weekly email summary of your edited Google Docs” from your assistant

Copy the prompt above, or connect your assistant first. Free plan, no credit card.