GMGoogleDrive Powershell Module

Google Drive REST API module for Powershell with Google Sheets API support.

Table of Contents

• GMGoogleDrive Powershell Module
  • Table of Contents
  • Google Project Setup
    • Project Creation
    • API Setup
    • Credentials Setup
      • OAuth 2.0
        • OAuth 2.0 Consent Screen
        • OAuth 2.0 Credentials
      • Service Account
  • Authorization Code and Refresh Token Retrieval
    • Using Powershell
      • Authorization Code
      • Refresh Token
    • Manually
  • Access Token Retrieval
  • Usage
  • Error Handling
  • Automation

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Google Project Setup

Google Drive is a free service for file storage files. In order to use this storage you need a Google user which will own the files, and a Google API client.

Project Creation

You need to create a Google project and enable the Google Drive API and Google Sheets API for it to use this module.

1. Navigate to the Google Cloud Console, create a new project and give it a name of your choosing.
   • You should be redirected to the Project Dashboard for your new project.

API Setup

1. Go to APIs & Services
   • Click on Enable APIs and Services.
   • Search for Google Drive API, click on it and then click Enable.
   • Search for Google Sheets API, click on it and then click Enable.

Credentials Setup

OAuth 2.0

OAuth 2.0 Consent Screen

Before setting up OAuth 2.0 credentials, you need to set up the OAuth consent screen. This is a one-time setup for your project. The consent screen is what users will see when they are asked to authorize your application to access their Google Drive files.

1. Navigate to APIs & Services
2. Navigate to OAuth consent screen
   • Click on Get Started
   • Under App Information fill in the following fields:
     • App name - be aware of the naming restrictions
     • User support email - normally your email address
   • Under Audience:
     • Select Internal if you are using a Google Workspace account
     • Select External if you are using a personal account
   • Under Contact Information fill in the following fields:
     • Email address - same as User support email
3. Click on Audience and under Test Users add the email addresses of the users who will be testing/using your application.

Note

Be aware of the limitations of an External application that is under Testing mode. The refresh token will expire after 7 days. If you want to have a non-expiring refresh token, you need to publish your application or use an Internal application.

OAuth 2.0 Credentials

1. Navigate to APIs & Services
2. Navigate to Credentials
   • Click on Create Credentials and select OAuth client ID
   • Under Application type select Web application
   • Under Authorized redirect URIs add the following URI https://developers.google.com/oauthplayground
   • Click on Create
   • Click on Download JSON to download the credentials file. This file contains your Client ID and Client Secret.

Warning

Make sure that the redirect URI does not have a trailing / at the end.

Here's how you can reference the credentials in your code:

$oAuthJson = Get-Content -Path 'C:\path\to\your\credentials.json' |
    ConvertFrom-Json

Service Account

Using a service account allows you to upload data to folders that are shared with the service account.

In Google Workspace enterprise environments, it is also possible to grant impersonation rights to the service account. With these rights, the service account can act as a user (without OAuth consent screen).

Please check the Google documentation:

• Create a service account
• Assign impersonation rights (domain-wide delegation)

Google offers two types of service user files .json and .p12. Both types are implemented in this module.

Get-GDriveAccessToken -Path D:\service_account.json `
-JsonServiceAccount -ImpersonationUser "[email protected]"

$keyData = Get-Content -AsByteStream -Path D:\service_account.p12

Get-GDriveAccessToken -KeyData $KeyData `
    -KeyId 'd41d8cd98f0b24e980998ecf8427e' `
    -ServiceAccountMail test-account@980998ecf8427e.iam.gserviceaccount.com `
    -ImpersonationUser "[email protected]"

Authorization Code and Refresh Token Retrieval

Using Powershell

Authorization Code

$authorizationCode = Request-GDriveAuthorizationCode -ClientID $oAuthJson.web.client_id `
-ClientSecret $oAuthJson.web.client_secret

Refresh Token

$refreshToken = Request-GDriveRefreshToken -ClientID $oAuthJson.web.client_id `
-ClientSecret $oAuthJson.web.client_secret `
-AuthorizationCode $authorizationCode

Manually

1. Browse to OAuth 2.0 Playground
2. Click the gear in the right-hand corner and place a checkmark next to "Use your own OAuth credentials"
   • Fill in the OAuth Client ID and OAuth Client Secret fields with the values from your credentials file.
3. Under Select & authorize APIs search and select the following scopes: 1.Under Drive API v3 select the following scopes:
   • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive
   • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive.file
4. Under Google Sheets API v4 select the following scopes:
   • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/spreadsheets
5. Click on Authorize APIs and follow the prompts to authorize the application.
6. Click on Exchange authorization code for tokens to get the your Refresh token.

Caution

The Refresh token can only be retrieved once. If you lose it, you will need to repeat the authorization process to get a new one.

Access Token Retrieval

Tip

The Access Token is a mandatory parameter for almost every GDrive cmdlet. It is valid for 1 hour and needs to be refreshed every hour.

$accessToken = Get-GDriveAccessToken -ClientID $oAuthJson.web.client_id `
    -ClientSecret $oAuthJson.web.client_secret `
    -RefreshToken $refreshToken.refresh_token

Usage

# Upload new file
Add-GDriveItem -AccessToken $access.access_token -InFile D:\SomeDocument.doc -Name SomeDocument.doc

# Search existing file
Find-GDriveItem -AccessToken $access.access_token -Query 'name="test.txt"'

# Update existing file contents
Set-GDriveItemContent -AccessToken $access.access_token -ID $file.id -StringContent 'test file'

# Get ParentFolderID and Modified Time for file
Get-GDriveItemProperty -AccessToken $access.access_token -ID $file.id -Property parents, modifiedTime

# and so on :)

Error Handling

Cmdlets will exit at the first error. However, for instance if "Metadata Upload" succeeded but content upload failed, UploadID is returned as ResumeID to resume operations later.

You can further leverage Get-GDriveError to get more information about the error by catching it in a try/catch block.

# Catch error
try {
    Get-GDriveItemProperty -AccessToken 'error token' -id 'error id'
    }
    catch {
        $err = $_
    }

# Decode error message
 Get-GDriveError $err

Automation

In order to automate operations, you can use the Get-GDriveAccessToken cmdlet to retrieve an access token and then use that token.

The functions below are meant to be used as an example only. It is outside of the scope of this module to provide a secure way to store your credentials. You can use the Protect-String and Unprotect-String functions to convert a string to a secure string and back.

Important

ConvertTo-SecureString and ConvertFrom-SecureString use the Windows Data Protection API (DPAPI) to encrypt and decrypt the string. This means that the encrypted string can only be decrypted on the same machine that it was encrypted on and by the user account that it was encrypted by.

function Protect-String {
    <#
        .SYNOPSIS
            Convert String to textual form of SecureString
        .PARAMETER String
            String to convert
        .OUTPUTS
            String
        .NOTES
            Author: MVKozlov
    #>
    param(
        [Parameter(Mandatory = $true, ValueFromPipeline = $true)]
        [string]
        $String
    )

    PROCESS {
        $String | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force |
            ConvertFrom-SecureString
    }
}

function Unprotect-String {
    <#
        .SYNOPSIS
            Convert SecureString to string
        .PARAMETER String
            String to convert (textual form of SecureString)
        .PARAMETER SecureString
            SecureString to convert
        .OUTPUTS
            String
        .NOTES
            Author: MVKozlov
    #>
    [CmdletBinding(DefaultParameterSetName = 'String')]
    param(
        [Parameter(Mandatory = $true, ValueFromPipeline = $true, Position = 0, ParameterSetName = 'String')]
        [string]
        $String,
        [Parameter(Mandatory = $true, ValueFromPipeline = $true, Position = 0, ParameterSetName = 'SecureString')]
        [securestring]
        $SecureString
    )

    PROCESS {
        if ($String) {
            $SecureString = $String | ConvertTo-SecureString
        }

        if ($SecureString) {
        (New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential '', ($SecureString)).Password
        }
    }
}

1. Open Powershell on the machine that will run the script using the specified user account.

   # Method 1: Using runas command
   runas /user:DOMAIN\username powershell.exe
   
   # Method 2: Using the `-Credential` parameter of Start-Process
   Start-Process powershell.exe -Credential (Get-Credential)

2. Use the Protect-String function to convert your credentials to a secure string and save it to a file.

   $credentials = [PSCustomObject]@{
       ClientID = 'clientid'
       ClientSecret = 'clientsecret'
       RefreshToken = 'refreshtoken'
   } | ConvertTo-Json | Protect-String |
       Set-Content -Path C:\Path\somefile -Value $credentials

3. In your automated script, use the Unprotect-String function to retrieve the credentials and use them to get the access token.

   $credentials = Get-Content -Path C:\path\somefile |
       Unprotect-String | ConvertFrom-Json
   
   try {
       Write-Host "Getting access token..."
   
       $token = Get-GDriveAccessToken -ClientID $credentials.ClientID `
           -ClientSecret $credentials.ClientSecret `
           -RefreshToken $credentials.RefreshToken
   
       Write-Host "Token expires $((Get-Date).AddSeconds($token.expires_in))"
   }
   catch {
       Write-Warning "Error retrieving access token $_"
       Get-GDriveError $_
   }
   
   if ($token) {
       $Summary = Get-GDriveSummary -AccessToken $token.access_token `
       -ErrorAction Stop
       # [rest of your code here]
   }