Get population context from every new planning file
Add a planning document to Drive and have Notis retrieve population estimates for the places it mentions, then summarize the useful context.
Trigger
File Created
Triggers when a new file is created in Google Drive.
Action
Get Population Estimates
Tool to retrieve population estimates program (pep) data for a specified vintage and dataset. use when you need population or demographic estimates for specific geographies.
Why this helps
Population context often lives in a separate research session, so planning documents get reviewed without the demographic numbers they need.
- Adds geographic context to new planning documents
- Cuts manual Census lookup and tab switching
- Surfaces missing or ambiguous geography for follow-up
Setup
Build it in a few focused steps.
- 1Connect Google Drive and Census bureau once in the Notis portal.
- 2Create an automation in Automations, New Automation, and give it a clear name.
- 3Tell Notis to read each new planning file, identify its named geographies, retrieve appropriate population estimates, and summarize the findings; ask it to flag unclear places.
- 4Pick the Google Drive File Created trigger and choose a report channel.
- 5Test with one real planning file and confirm the report includes the estimate vintage and any unresolved geography.
Questions about this workflow
Does this work with every Drive file?
It starts when a new file is created. Notis can only extract geography from content it can read, so ask it to flag files or place names it cannot interpret.
Which population vintage will it use?
The action retrieves population estimates for a specified vintage and dataset. State the vintage or selection rule in the prompt, and review the report for the vintage used.
When this happens · Trigger
Do this · Action
Supported Triggers and Actions
Notis builds workflows that link Google Drive to Census bureau. A trigger fires from one place; an action lands in another.
Google Drive triggers
Census bureau actions
Recurring trigger
Notis starts this workflow on a schedule, such as daily, weekly, or during business hours.
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Webhook trigger
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Get ACS 5-Year Estimates
Tool to retrieve 5-year american community survey estimates for a specified year. use when detailed acs data by geography and variables is required.
Comment Added (Docs/Sheets/Slides)
Triggers when a new comment is added to Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides.
Get American Business Survey
Tool to retrieve annual business survey (abs) data for a specified year and endpoint.
File Created
Triggers when a new file is created in Google Drive.
Get Community Resilience Estimates
Tool to retrieve community resilience estimates for a specified year. use after selecting variables and geography to get cre data for analysis.
File Deleted or Trashed
Triggers when a file is moved to trash or permanently deleted in Drive.
Get County Business Patterns
Tool to retrieve county business patterns (cbp) data for a specified year. use when you need county-level business establishment and employment statistics filtered by industry and geography.
File Shared (Permissions Added)
Triggers when new sharing permissions are granted to a file or folder. Uses Drive's `changes.list` endpoint with inline `permissions` in the `fields` mask so each change carries the file's current permission set provider-atomically. We diff that against `seen_permission_keys` to identify newly added grants. Drive page tokens are the primary cursor; if Drive rejects a stored token, the trigger raises `PollingTriggerError` without clearing state rather than silently re-baselining and dropping events. Limitation: truly ephemeral permissions (added and revoked between two polls without any other file modification in between) are not detected. Drive Activity API would catch those but requires an additional OAuth scope and a different payload contract.
Get Decennial Census Data
Tool to retrieve decennial census data for a specified vintage and dataset. use when you need census variables for a given geography.
File Updated
Triggers when a file's metadata or content changes in Google Drive.
Get Population Estimates
Tool to retrieve population estimates program (pep) data for a specified vintage and dataset. use when you need population or demographic estimates for specific geographies.
Google Drive Changes
Triggers when changes are detected in a Google Drive.
Get Variable Details
Tool to retrieve metadata for a specific variable in a census dataset for a given year. use when you need the label, concept, data type, attribute codes, and valid-value constraints.
Connect any two apps with Notis in the middle.
Google Drive and Census bureau, or any other combination from 1,000+ integrations.
When this happens · Trigger
Do this · Action
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