Event Objects

Simple triggers and installable triggers let Apps Script run a function automatically if a certain event occurs. When a trigger fires, Apps Script passes the function an event object as an argument, typically called e. The event object contains information about the context that caused the trigger to fire. For example, the sample code below shows a simple onEdit(e) trigger for a Google Sheets script that uses the event object to determine which cell was edited.

function onEdit(e){
  // Set a comment on the edited cell to indicate when it was changed.
  var range = e.range;
  range.setNote('Last modified: ' + new Date());
}

This page details the fields in the event object for different types of triggers.

Events produced by installable triggers contain a triggerUid identifying the trigger that produced the event. This is helpful for scripts that have multiple installable triggers.

Google Sheets events

The various Google Sheets-specific triggers let scripts respond to a user's actions in a spreadsheet.

Open (simple and installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. LIMITED
source	A Spreadsheet object, representing the Google Sheets file to which the script is bound. Spreadsheet
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event (installable triggers only). 4034124084959907503
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]

Change (installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL
changeType	The type of change (EDIT, INSERT_ROW, INSERT_COLUMN, REMOVE_ROW, REMOVE_COLUMN, INSERT_GRID, REMOVE_GRID, FORMAT, or OTHER). INSERT_ROW
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event. 4034124084959907503
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]

Edit (simple and installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. LIMITED
oldValue	Cell value prior to the edit, if any. Only available if the edited range is a single cell. Will be undefined if the cell had no previous content. 1234
range	A Range object, representing the cell or range of cells that were edited. Range
source	A Spreadsheet object, representing the Google Sheets file to which the script is bound. Spreadsheet
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event (installable triggers only). 4034124084959907503
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]
value	New cell value after the edit. Only available if the edited range is a single cell. 10

Form submit (installable)
Caution: Make sure you use this form submit trigger with SpreadsheetTriggerBuilder.
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL
namedValues	An object containing the question names and values from the form submission. { 'First Name': ['Jane'], 'Timestamp': ['6/7/2015 20:54:13'], 'Last Name': ['Doe'] }
range	A Range object, representing the cell or range of cells that were edited. Range
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event. 4034124084959907503
values	Array with values in the same order as they appear in the spreadsheet. ['2015/05/04 15:00', '[e-mail]', 'Bob', '27', 'Bill', '28', 'Susan', '25']

Google Docs events

Triggers allow Google Docs to respond when a user opens a document.

Open (simple and installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. LIMITED
source	A Document object, representing the Google Docs file to which the script is bound. Document
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event (installable triggers only). 4034124084959907503
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]

Google Slides events

Triggers allow Google Slides to respond when a user opens a presentation.

Open (simple)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. LIMITED
source	A Presentation object, representing the Google Slides file to which the script is bound. Presentation
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]

Google Forms events

The Google Forms-specific triggers let scripts respond when a user edits a form or submits a response.

Open * (simple and installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. LIMITED
source	A Form object, representing the Google Forms file to which the script is bound. Form
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event (installable triggers only). 4034124084959907503
user	A User object, representing the active user, if available (depending on a complex set of security restrictions). [e-mail]

* This event does not occur when a user opens a form to respond, but rather when an editor opens the form to modify it.

Form submit (installable)
Caution: Make sure you use this form submit trigger with FormTriggerBuilder.
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL
response	A FormResponse object, representing the user's response to the form as a whole. FormResponse
source	A Form object, representing the Google Forms file to which the script is bound. Form
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event. 4034124084959907503

Google Calendar events

Calendar triggers fire when a user's calendar events are updated (created, edited, or deleted).

These triggers do not tell you which event changed or how it changed. Instead, they indicate that your code needs to do an incremental sync operation to pick up recent changes to the calendar. For a full description of this procedure, see the Synchronizing resources guide for the Calendar API.

To synchronize with Calendar in Apps Script, perform the following steps:

1. Enable the Calendar advanced service for the script project. The built-in Calendar service isn't sufficent for this workflow.
2. Determine what calendars should be synchronized. For each such calendar, perform an intitial sync operation using the Calendar advanced service's Events.list() method.
3. The result of the initial sync returns a nextSyncToken for that calendar. Store this token for later use.
4. When the Apps Script EventUpdated trigger fires indicating a calendar event change, perform an incremental sync for the affected calendar using the stored nextSyncToken. This is essentially another Events.list() request, but providing the nextSyncToken limits the response to only events that have changed since the last sync.
5. Examine the response of the sync to learn what events were updated and have your code respond appropriately. For example, you can log the change, update a spreadsheet, send email notices, or take other actions.
6. Update the nextSyncToken you stored for that calendar with the one returned by the incremental sync request. This forces the next sync operation to only return the most current changes.

Caution: Occasionally sync tokens are invalidated by the server, resulting in a 410 error. When this happens, your code should conduct a full sync and replace all the stored synced data and tokens you have for that calendar.

EventUpdated (installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL
calendarId	The string ID of the calendar where the event update occurred. [e-mail]
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event. 4034124084959907503

Add-on events

The onInstall() trigger runs automatically when a user installs an add-on.

Install (simple)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL

Time-driven events

Time-driven triggers (also called clock triggers) let scripts execute at a particular time or on a recurring interval.

Time-driven (installable)
authMode	A value from the ScriptApp.AuthMode enum. FULL
day-of-month	Between 1 and 31. Because this property name contains dashes it must be accessed via e['day-of-month'] rather than dot notation. 31
day-of-week	Between 1 (Monday) and 7 (Sunday). Because this property name contains dashes it must be accessed via e['day-of-week'] rather than dot notation. 7
hour	Between 0 and 23. 23
minute	Between 0 and 59. 59
month	Between 1 and 12. 12
second	Between 0 and 59. 59
timezone	The timezone. UTC
triggerUid	ID of trigger that produced this event. 4034124084959907503
week-of-year	Between 1 and 52. Because this property name contains dashes it must be accessed via e['week-of-year'] rather than dot notation. 52
year	The year. 2015