PyDrive

Warnings

• breaking The original PyDrive project is explicitly deprecated and no longer maintained. Its GitHub repository has been archived. No further changes or bug fixes will be made, leading to potential future incompatibilities and security vulnerabilities.
  Fix: Migrate to `PyDrive2` (`pip install pydrive2`), an actively maintained fork, for continued support, new features, and bug fixes.
• deprecated PyDrive relies heavily on the `oauth2client` library for authentication, which is deprecated by Google and largely unmaintained. This can lead to security vulnerabilities, lack of thread-safety, and incompatibilities with newer Python versions or related libraries (e.g., `PyOpenSSL` or `httplib2`).
  Fix: The recommended solution is to migrate to `PyDrive2`, which aims to address these underlying dependency issues by migrating to `google-auth`.
• gotcha Authentication refresh tokens obtained from Google Cloud projects with an 'external user type' and a 'Testing' publishing status will expire after 7 days, requiring manual re-authentication.
  Fix: To avoid frequent re-authentication in production or long-running scripts, ensure your OAuth consent screen's publishing status in the Google API Console is set to 'In production'.
• gotcha By default, PyDrive's authentication might only grant access to root-level files and folders on your Google Drive. Accessing subfolders or files outside the default scope requires explicit configuration.
  Fix: To grant broader access, you must manually specify the `oauth_scope` in a `settings.yaml` file (e.g., `oauth_scope: ['https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive']`) and then re-authenticate to apply the new scopes. Deleting existing `credentials.json` before re-authentication might be necessary.
• gotcha The `client_secrets.json` file, required for authentication, must be named exactly `client_secrets.json` and placed in the working directory of your script for PyDrive to find it automatically. Incorrect naming or placement will result in authentication errors.
  Fix: Ensure the downloaded client configuration JSON file is renamed to `client_secrets.json` and resides in the same directory where your Python script is executed. Alternatively, you can explicitly specify the file path via `GoogleAuth.DEFAULT_SETTINGS['client_config_file']` or `gauth.LoadClientConfig(client_config_file='path/to/your/client_secrets.json')`.

Install

• pip install pydrive Install PyDrive

Imports

• GoogleAuth

  from pydrive.auth import GoogleAuth

• GoogleDrive

  from pydrive.drive import GoogleDrive

Quickstart

This quickstart demonstrates how to authenticate with Google Drive using PyDrive's `LocalWebserverAuth()` flow and then create and upload a simple text file. It also includes basic error handling for token expiration and shows how to list files. Ensure you have a `client_secrets.json` file from the Google API Console in your script's directory before running.

from pydrive.auth import GoogleAuth
from pydrive.drive import GoogleDrive
import os

# --- Pre-requisites for Quickstart ---
# 1. Go to Google API Console (console.developers.google.com/apis/credentials)
# 2. Create a new project or select an existing one.
# 3. Enable the 'Google Drive API'.
# 4. Create 'OAuth client ID' credentials:
#    - Application type: 'Web application'
#    - Authorized JavaScript origins: http://localhost:8080
#    - Authorized redirect URIs: http://localhost:8080/
# 5. Download the client configuration JSON file and rename it to 'client_secrets.json'.
# 6. Place 'client_secrets.json' in the same directory as this script.
# -------------------------------------

gauth = GoogleAuth()

# Try to load saved client credentials (e.g., from 'credentials.json' generated previously)
gauth.LoadCredentials()

if gauth.credentials is None:
    # Authenticate if credentials are not found
    print("Performing initial authentication via local webserver...")
    gauth.LocalWebserverAuth() # Creates local webserver and auto handles authentication.
elif gauth.access_token_expired:
    # Refresh them if expired
    print("Refreshing expired access token...")
    gauth.Refresh()
else:
    # Initialize the saved credentials
    print("Using existing credentials.")
    gauth.Authorize()

# Save the current credentials to a file for future use
gauth.SaveCredentials()

drive = GoogleDrive(gauth)

# --- Create and Upload a File ---
file_title = "PyDrive_Registry_Test_File.txt"
file_content = "This is a test file uploaded using PyDrive from the registry quickstart. Hello, Google Drive!"

# Create GoogleDriveFile instance with metadata.
file_metadata = {'title': file_title, 'mimeType': 'text/plain'}
file1 = drive.CreateFile(file_metadata)
file1.SetContentString(file_content) # Set content from a string
file1.Upload() # Upload the file to Google Drive
print(f"\nSuccessfully uploaded file: '{file1['title']}' (ID: {file1['id']})")

# --- List Files (optional, for demonstration) ---
print(f"\nSearching for file with title '{file_title}'...")
file_list = drive.ListFile({'q': f"'me' in owners and title = '{file_title}' and trashed = false"}).GetList()
if file_list:
    print(f"Found {len(file_list)} file(s) with title '{file_title}':")
    for file in file_list:
        print(f" - Title: {file['title']}, ID: {file['id']}, MimeType: {file['mimeType']}")
else:
    print(f"No file found with title '{file_title}'.")