---
# slug: /tir
sidebar_position: 8
title: Access Google Drive in Instances
---

# Access Google Drive in Instances

This guide explains how to connect Google Drive with Instances. It covers setting up OAuth2 credentials, authenticating, and performing a common action (downloading a file). Other operations (search, upload, create folder) are possible and linked at the end.

## Quick Start

You can use the tutorial notebook as a hands‑on example:

- Online notebook: https://tir.e2enetworks.com/github/tire2e/notebooks/blob/main/notebooks/tir-tutorials/drive_access_in_notebook.ipynb

Download the notebook into JupyterLab terminal:

```bash
wget https://github.com/tire2e/notebooks/raw/main/notebooks/tir-tutorials/drive_access_in_notebook.ipynb
```

## Prerequisites

- Google account and access to Google Cloud Console: https://console.cloud.google.com
- Google Drive API enabled for your project: https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/api/drive.googleapis.com/

---

## Setup Instructions

### Step 1 — Configure the OAuth Consent Screen

1. Open the Google Cloud Console and choose (or create) a project.
2. Go to **APIs & Services → OAuth consent screen**.
3. Select **User type = External** (unless you have an organization-internal use case).
4. Set **Publishing status = In Production** to avoid 7‑day token expiry for testing credentials.
5. Fill required fields (App name, Support email). Save the consent configuration.

**Note:** If the app is not published to *In Production*, user-consent tokens created via the OAuth flow will expire after 7 days and require re-authentication.

---

### Step 2 — Create OAuth2 Credentials (detailed)

1. In Cloud Console go to **APIs & Services → Credentials**.
2. Click **Create credentials → OAuth client ID**. If prompted, complete the consent screen first.
3. For **Application type**, choose **Web application**.
4. Give the credential a name (e.g., "Instance Client").
5. Under **Authorized JavaScript origins** add:
   - `https://notebooks.e2enetworks.com:443`

6. Under **Authorized redirect URIs** add:
   - `https://tir.e2enetworks.com/oauth2callback/`

7. Click **Create**. Download the JSON file of the OAuth client (it contains client_id and client_secret).
8. Upload the downloaded JSON file into your JupyterLab session (use the Upload button in the file browser or the toolbar upload icon).

In your notebook, set the path to the uploaded credentials JSON, for example:

```python
creds_file_path = "path/to/your/credentials_file.json"
```

---

### Step 3 — Install required Python libraries

Run in your Instance environment:

```bash
pip3 install --upgrade google-auth google-api-python-client google-auth-oauthlib google-auth-httplib2
```

(Adding `google-auth-httplib2` can help in some environments.)

---

### Step 4 — Authenticate and initialize the Drive client

The code below does a robust check: it loads existing `token.json` if present, refreshes if possible, or runs a full OAuth flow and saves `token.json` for reuse.

```python
import os
import io
from googleapiclient.discovery import build
from google.oauth2.credentials import Credentials
from google_auth_oauthlib.flow import InstalledAppFlow
from google.auth.transport.requests import Request

SCOPES = ['https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive']
creds = None

# Load existing credentials if available
if os.path.exists('token.json'):
    creds = Credentials.from_authorized_user_file('token.json', SCOPES)

# If there are no valid credentials, start OAuth flow
if not creds or not creds.valid:
    if creds and creds.expired and creds.refresh_token:
        creds.refresh(Request())
    else:
        flow = InstalledAppFlow.from_client_secrets_file(
            creds_file_path,
            SCOPES,
            redirect_uri='https://tir.e2enetworks.com/oauth2callback/'
        )
        auth_url, _ = flow.authorization_url(prompt='consent')
        print('Go to the following URL in your browser:')
        print(auth_url)
        code = input('Enter the authorization code: ')
        flow.fetch_token(code=code)
        creds = flow.credentials

    # Save the credentials for the next run
    with open('token.json', 'w') as token:
        token.write(creds.to_json())

# Build the Drive API client
service = build('drive', 'v3', credentials=creds)
```

**How the flow works (short):** the script prints a URL — open it in a browser, authorize the app with your Google account, copy the authorization code shown, and paste it back into the notebook prompt. On success, `token.json` is saved so you won't need to re-authenticate each run (unless the token expires).

---

## Example (most useful): Download a file

This is the most common operation for notebook users who want to fetch datasets from Drive.

```python
from googleapiclient.http import MediaIoBaseDownload

file_id = 'your_file_id_here'         # replace with the Drive file ID
file_path = 'downloaded_file.ext'     # local path where the file will be saved

request = service.files().get_media(fileId=file_id)
fh = io.FileIO(file_path, mode='wb')
downloader = MediaIoBaseDownload(fh, request)
done = False

while not done:
    status, done = downloader.next_chunk()
    if status:
        print(f"Download {int(status.progress() * 100)}%.")
print('Download complete:', file_path)
```

:::info
The Drive API supports searching, listing, uploading, and creating folders. If you need examples for those operations, the tutorial notebook and Google Drive API docs have full samples.
:::

---

## Troubleshooting and best practices

- **Redirect URI mismatch**: The redirect URI in your OAuth credentials must match exactly `https://tir.e2enetworks.com/oauth2callback/`. If it differs, the OAuth flow will fail.
- **Token expiry**: If the OAuth consent screen is not published to *In Production*, tokens granted may expire after 7 days — publish to In Production for persistent testing credentials.
- **Credentials path**: Ensure the JSON credentials file is uploaded and `creds_file_path` points to the correct location in the notebook.
- **Authorization code**: Copy the authorization code exactly (no extra spaces/newlines).
- **Headless environments**: If you cannot open the browser on the machine, run the flow on your local laptop, then copy `token.json` to the notebook environment.

---

## References

- Google Drive API guides: https://developers.google.com/drive/api/guides/about-sdk
- OAuth consent screen: https://developers.google.com/workspace/guides/configure-oauth-consent#configure_oauth_consent
- Create credentials: https://developers.google.com/workspace/guides/create-credentials#oauth-client-id



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