CODEWITHSUNDEEP
google-apioauth-2.0google-drive-api
user1698561
user1698561

Reputation: 43

Using OAuth 2.0 for Devices - Google API - Google Drive

I took a look in some docs at developers.google and some questions here in stackoverflow and I really would like to found an objective answer about use the Google OAuth Server to authenticate an application and grant access to download docs into a Google Drive account with NO BROWSER interaction.

As far as I could look, docs like "Using OAuth 2.0 for Server to Server Applications", "Using OAuth 2.0 for Devices", answers here, I couldn't found an article saying "Is possible to authorize an application to get files from a common Google Drive account in Devices with no browser...".

Anyone have tried and had success in this jorney?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1300

Answers (2)

bvstone
bvstone

Reputation: 607

It can be done, but a browser does need to be used. I've successfully gotten OAuth 2.0 working on an IBM i (AS/400, iSeries, System i, whatever the name is today) which doesn't have a browser. I've so far implemented the Calendar and Google Cloud Print APIs.

During the OAuth 2.0 negotiation you will be returned a URL and a code. You need to display the URL for the user to go to, then the code to enter to grant authority for that specific API/scope. I have an example in our documentation here:

http://docs.bvstools.com/home/greentools-for-google-apps/docs/g4g-base-commands/g4gregsvc

But, the issue now is that the drive API is not yet available to devices. But, Google has said that soon it should be.

Upvotes: 0

Jan Gerlinger
Jan Gerlinger

Reputation: 7415

The Devices flow is meant for applications that run on devices where no browser is present (fancy example could be a wristwatch that shows new G+ notifications) and requires the user to do manual steps on a device that has a browser. Also this is for getting access to data on the user's account.

UPDATE:

As you say you have an embedded application running without a browser available and want to access data on behalf of a user, this is definitely the way to go. This however still needs the user to login (once) on another device with a browser. After you got an access token using this flow, you can then access the Google Drive API either manually or by using some library.

So you want to access data on Google Drive that belongs to a special account and only your application can access it without a browser involved?

A Service Account (the Server-to-Server flow) would be exactly what you need. These however are only for usage on a web server, as otherwise your private keyfile would have to be deployed to a client, where it could easily be extracted.

One thing you could do is use your own web server that fetches data from your Google account using a Service Account and have a client application that only connects to your own web server. This has of course also its downsides, especially when it comes to locking down your web server so no third party clients could access it.

Upvotes: 2

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