quarto-adsense: A Quarto Extension for Google Adsense

The adsense extension allows you to incorporate Google Adsense (GADS) ad's on various Quarto formats, including HTML, Websites, and Books.

This extension is required as Quarto does not natively support Google Adsense, but does have support for Google Analytics.

Installation

To install the adsense extension, follow these steps:

1. Open your terminal.

2. Execute the following command:

quarto add coatless-quarto/adsense

This command will download and install the extension under the _extensions subdirectory of your Quarto project. If you are using version control, ensure that you include this directory in your repository.

Usage

There are two modes available for the extension:

1. A global configuration that allows a consistent option to be set for multiple pages with an option to opt a page out.
2. A localized single page configuration.

Note: Ads may take up to an hour to appear on the page/project.

Multi-page Projects: Websites and Books

If you have a website or book, you can use either the _quarto.yml or _metadata.yml files to avoid needing to consistently set the value. Add into the configuration file:

adsense:
  publisher-id: ca-pub-XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

filters:
- adsense

where XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX in publisher-id is your Google Adsense Publisher ID.

If you wish to disable ads on a specific page, then add to the Quarto document's YAML header area:

adsense:
  enable-ads: false

For more information, please see Quarto's documentation on Shared Metadata.

Single Page Projects: HTML Document

If you only have one HTML document, we recommend setting up the extension by placing the required fields into the document's header section, e.g.

---
title: "Demo Setup"
author: "FirstName LastName"
adsense:
  publisher-id: ca-pub-XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
filters:
- adsense
---

Google Adsense Setup: Adding ads.txt

To ensure smooth integration with Google Adsense, it's essential to create a standalone file named ads.txt within your project directory that identifies the domain as being authorized to serve ads. Follow these steps to include the ads.txt file:

1. Create ads.txt File: In the root of your project, create a new file named ads.txt.

2. Add Google Publisher ID: Open ads.txt and insert the following line, replacing XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX with your actual Google Publisher ID:

   google.com, pub-XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0
   

   This line informs Google's web crawler about your association with the provided Publisher ID. For an example, please see the docs/ads.txt.

3. Save and Include in Version Control: Save the changes to ads.txt and ensure that the file is included in your version control system if you're using one.

4. Register ads.txt in _quarto.yml: Open the _quarto.yml configuration and add the resources line under the project key.

   project:
     type: website # default, book, revealjs
     resources:
       - ads.txt 

   This ensures the additional file resources are copied to the output directory.

This step is crucial for validating your ownership of the website and enabling a smooth interaction between your Quarto-generated content and Google Adsense. Remember to replace XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX with your specific Google Publisher ID.

References

• Google Adsense
  • Google Adsense: Find Publisher ID
  • Google Adsense: Ads.txt guide
  • Google Adsense: Get and copy the AdSense code
  • Google Adsense: Where to place the AdSense code in your HTML
• Quarto
  • Quarto: Lua API Reference
  • Quarto: Lua Development
• Pandoc
  • Pandoc: Lua Filters
  • Pandoc: Lua type reference
  • Lua: Manual

Disclaimer

This Quarto extension is open source software and is not affiliated with Google. The extension is at best a community effort to simplify the integration of Google's Adsense product inside of Quarto websites.