Linked Slides Help

Introduction

Ever found yourself asking, "Where are these slides used?" The Linked Slides Add-on is designed to answer exactly that. This powerful tool integrates seamlessly with Google Slides™, allowing you to discover which presentations contain linked copies of your slides.

Whether you're managing complex presentations, ensuring consistency across different documents, or simply tracking content usage, our add-on provides the insights you need with a simple click. It helps you:

Quickly identify which presentations reuse your slides and which slides are not being used.
Understand the impact and reach of your shared slides.
Save time by avoiding manual searches for slide usage.

Before you begin: Creating and updating linked copies of slides

The ability to create and update linked copies of slides is built-in to Google Slides. If you are unfamiliar with that feature, please refer to Google's documentation or the video below.

Once you've created linked copies of slides, the Linked Slides Add-on can help you manage them.

Installing the add-on

To install the Linked Slides Add-on:

Open a Google Slides presentation.
Go to "Extensions" > "Add-ons" > "Get add-ons".
Search for "Linked Slides" and install it.
Grant the necessary permissions when prompted.

Launching the add-on

To start using the Linked Slides Add-on:

Open a Google Slides presentation.
Go to "Extensions" > "Linked Slides Add-on" > "Find linked copies".
A file selection dialog will open for you to select the presentations you want to search for linked copies.

Selecting presentations to search

In the file selection dialog:

Select one or more Google Slides presentations to search for linked slides.
Click "Select".
(Optional) Click "Add files" to select more presentations to search. If you have done an earlier search, you will also have the option of clicking "Add files from most recent search" to quickly add all of those files.
(Optional) Click the red X next to a presentation that you no longer want to search for linked slides.
(Optional) Click the name of a presentation to open it a new window/tab so that you can check that it is actually the presentation you want to search.
Click "Start search" to start the presentations for slides that are linked copies of slides in the current presentation. The search results will be displayed in a sidebar.

Understanding the search results

A table containing the search results is displayed in a sidebar. It contains the following columns:

Source Slide: The slide from the current presentation.
Target Presentation: The presentation where linked copies of the source slide were found.
Target Slide:The slide in the target presentation that is a linked copy.

At the top of the sidebar is a "Search again" button you can use to start a new search.

Navigating to slides and presentations

Clicking the links in the table will take you to the specified slide or presentation. Specifically:

Click a link in the Source Slide column to show that slide in the current presentation.
Click a link in the Target Presentation column to open that presentation in a different window or tab.
Click a link in the Target Slide column to show that slide in the target presentation in a different window or tab.

Filtering search results

The search results can be filtered to focus on specific slides or presentations.

Filtering to show only the current slide(s)

To filter results to show only the currently selected slide(s) in the active presentation:

Select the slide(s) in the filmstrip you want to filter by. To select multiple slides, use Shift-click, Ctrl-click, and/or Cmd-click as needed.
Click the filter icon in the "Source Slide" column header.
Click "Select current slide(s)" in the dropdown menu that opens.

Filtering to show source slides which were not linked

To filter results to show source slides which were not linked to slides in any of the target presentations:

Click the filter icon in the "Source Slide" column header.
Deselect "All".
Select "(Blank)".

Additional features

Here are some other features that you might find useful:

Selecting the "Show abbreviated titles" checkbox above the search results table abbreviates long titles to reduce the height of table rows.
Clicking the "Sort Ascending" or "Sort Descending" items in the dropdown menus sorts the search results by the selected column.

Getting support

If you have any questions or need further assistance, please contact support@greenduckpunch.com.

Please include your user code, which can be found by going to "Extensions" > "Linked Slides Add-on" > "Contact support".