Open a Sharepoint online Excel file in the Excel app for Android using a link or intent

Question

I would like to launch the Excel for Android app with an online file (from Sharepoint) opened for editing, exactly like the app does when creating a widget with a link (file > overflow menu > Add to Home screen).

The problem is that I cannot use the widget itself, because I need the linked file to change every day. So I'm using Graph API to retrieve the URI to the Excel file which is something like this:

https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name/_layouts/15/Doc.aspx?sourcedoc=%7BCDA3AAB1-D143-4296-949C-D72C2086B8D9%7D&file=MyFileName.xlsx&action=default&mobileredirect=true

If I navigate to that URL with a browser when logged in, I can see the file contents:

Then tapping Open in app launch the Excel app with the file.

I would like to automate this using either an Intent or a specially built URI that can invoke the Excel app directly, like the widget or the Open in app function do. However, I cannot find any documentation, maybe it is not possible?

Microsoft says there are specific URIs to do that, but if I try with:

ms-excel:ofe|u|https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name/_layouts/15/Doc.aspx?sourcedoc=%7BCDA3AAB1-D143-4296-949C-D72C2086B8D9%7D&file=MyFileName.xlsx|a|App

I always get an error message:

I also tried getting the download URI from the Graph API @microsoft.graph.downloadUrl attribute, which results in an URI like this:

https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name/_layouts/15/download.aspx?UniqueId=cda3aab1-d143-4296-949c-d72c2086b8d9&Translate=false&tempauth=eyJhbALOTOFCHARACTERS&ApiVersion=2.0

However, launching that in a browser (or sending an android.intent.action.VIEW intent, which opens the browser too) results in a file download dialog. I would like to open the online file directly and this is possible with the widget, so there should be a way?

Answer 1

Apparently, the key is rewriting the URL manually, once you know the correct "rules" (this helped). So from this page:

you first have to copy the URL visible in the browser, for example like so:

https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name/_layouts/15/Doc.aspx?sourcedoc=%7BCDA3AAB1-D143-4296-949C-D72C2086B8D9%7D&file=MyFileName.xlsx&action=default&mobileredirect=true

Then, from that URL:

1. keep the part: https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name
2. remove the part: /_layouts/15/Doc.aspx?sourcedoc=%7BCDA3AAB1-D143-4296-949C-D72C2086B8D9%7D&file=
3. add the path of where the file is located (important!) according to the OneDrive for Business folders, for example: /Documents/Folder%20with%spaces/ (💡 tip: make sure to insert /Documents/ because it seems necessary for OneDrive for Business links, even though it's not visible in the browser folder tree)
4. keep the file name: MyFileName.xlsx
5. remove the rest
6. add ms-excel:ofe|u| in front

After applying the edits, the URL above becomes:

ms-excel:ofe|u|https://name-my.sharepoint.com/personal/full_domain_name/Documents/Folder%20with%spaces/MyFileName.xlsx

Navigating to that URL from a link (or sending an Intent) should open that file directly in Excel!