CurlGoogle

CurlGoogle is a lightweight, easy-to-use, and extremely simple library that allows you to link devices to Google accounts and transfer files (upload/download) using nothing more than the command line. Built on the principles demonstrated in this article, this library offers a lean alternative to more extensive libraries such as google-drive.

With absolutely no specific dependencies needed apart from curl, you can get up and running with file transfers on Google Drive in no time. The library's minimalistic design makes it not only easy to install but also to understand and use.

Installation

To install the library, open your terminal and type the following command:

pip install curlgoogle

This command installs the library from the source directory (TODO: add to PyPI).

Usage

(Disclaimer: Most of the explanation here is derived from this article.)

Installing curl

You should install curl on the device you are trying to run this package (this is the only dependency).

sudo apt install curl # Linux Debian/Ubuntu
brew install curl # Mac

Creating a Google Cloud Platform Project and Acquiring Credentials

In order to manage access to our Google Drive, we need to establish a level of control. This can be achieved by creating a project that incorporates user-specified permissions. This project will function as an intermediary between our users (or us, when using a different machine) and our Google account. The initial step in this process is to navigate to the specified page and set up a new project.

Now, select the Credentials tab and then create credentials which is OAuth Client ID in particular. For app type, you may select anything!

After setting up, you now have a client ID and a client secret. You will need these to authenticate your requests. To automate the process, we use [Dotenv] to store your secrets. Make sure to add .env in your .gitignore file to avoid sharing your secrets with the world!

Run the following commands to install dotenv and create a .env file with the appropriate variables:

pip install python-dotenv
dotenv set GDRIVE_CLIENT_ID <your_client_id>
dotenv set GDRIVE_CLIENT_SECRET <your_client_secret>

Upload and Download

After the setup phase, you're good to go! You do not need to repeat this phase again for your project as the credentials are safely stored in your .env file and the library automatically loads them when you import it.

You can use either a commandline interface (CLI) to upload/download files, or use the library sdk.

CLI

Use the following format for download and upload

curlgoogle_upload <file_name> <file1> <file2> ... <fileN> (optional)<file_id>

file_name will determine the zip file that will be created and uploaded to your Google Drive. file1 to fileN are the files that you want to upload. file_id is the id of the folder you want to upload to. If you do not specify a file_id, the file will be uploaded to the root directory of your Google Drive.

For download use the following format:

curlgoogle_download <file_id>

This will automatically download the file with the specified file_id to your current directory and unzip it for you.

SDK

You can also use the following functions for upload and download while development. Note that this will automatically prompt you to authenticate your Google account mid-run; therefore, it might not be the ideal use case for production.

# Uplaoding function
curlgoogle.upload(
    file_name: str, 
    file_list: List[str], 
    folder_id: Optional[str] = None
)
# Downloading function
curlgoogle.download(
    file_id: str
)

License

This project is licensed under MIT License.