Develop Reference

Google oauth session lost after page reload (javascript)

I recently moved from the deprecated gapi.auth2 to the new Google Identity Services, using the javascript client library, and noticed a big difference: if someone signs in, and then reloads the page, the session is lost, and has to sign in again, every time the page is loaded. This was not the case with the deprecated library.
The problem can be easily reproduced with the Calendar API example.
Is there any configuration option to keep the session persistent? Or do I need to store the access tokens somehow? I could not find anything relevant in the official docs.
UPDATE:
The migration guide states the following:
Previously, Google Sign-In helped you to manage user signed-in status using:
Callback handlers for Monitoring the user's session state.
Listeners for events and changes to signed-in status for a user's Google Account.
You are responsible for managing sign-in state and user sessions to your web app.
However there's absolutely no information on what needs to be done.
UPDATE 2
To be more specific, the actual issue is not making the session persistent. Managing the sign in state and user session is something I can solve.
The real problem is the access token used to call the Google APIs.
As mentioned in the comments, the access tokens are 1) short lived 2) are not stored anywhere, so even if not expired, they do not persist between page reloads.
Google provides the requestAccessToken method for this, however even if I specify prompt: '', it opens the sign-in popup. If I also specify the hint option with the signed in user's email address, than the popup opens, displays a loading animation briefly, and closes without user interaction. I could live with this, however this only works if triggered by a user interaction, otherwise the browser blocks the popup window, meaning that I cannot renew the token without user interaction, e.g. on page load. Any tips to solve this?

I faced all the same issues you described in your question.
In order to help:
Google 3P Authorization JavaScript Library: in this link we can check all the methods the new library has (it does not refresh token, etc..)
This doc says the library won't control the cookies to keep the state anymore.
Solution
Firstly I need to thanks #Sam O'Riil answer.
As Sam described: "you can somehow save access token and use it to speed-up things after page reload."
Given the the Google's exampe, we should call initTokenClient in order to configure the Google Auth and the requestAccessToken to popup the auth:
tokenClient = google.accounts.oauth2.initTokenClient({
client_id: 'YOUR_CLIENT_ID',
scope: 'https://www.googleapis.com/auth/calendar.readonly',
prompt: 'consent',
callback: tokenCallback
});
tokenClient.requestAccessToken({prompt: ''})
In your tokenCallback you can save the credentials you get somehow, e.g.:
const tokenCallback(credentials) => {
// save here the credentials using localStorage or cookies or whatever you want to.
}
Finally, when you restart/reload your application and you initialize the gapi.server again, you only need to get the credentials again and set token to gapi, like:
gapi.load('client', function() {
gapi.client.init({}).then(function() {
let credentials = // get your credentials from where you saved it
credentials = JSON.parse(credentials); // parse it if you got it as string
gapi.client.setToken(credentials);
... continue you app ...
}).catch(function(err) {
// do catch...
});
});
Doing it, your application will work after the reload. I know it could not be the best solution, but seeing what you have and the library offers, I think that's you can do.
p.s.: the token expires after 1 hour and there is no refresh token (using the implicit flow) so, you will have to ask the user to sign-in again.

Single flow: sign user in via Google oAuth AND grant offline/server access?

I'm trying to implement Google sign-in and API access for a web app with a Node.js back end. Google's docs provide two options using a combo of platform.js client-side and google-auth-library server-side:
Google Sign-In with back-end auth, via which users can log into my app using their Google account. (auth2.signIn() on the client and verifyIdToken() on the server.)
Google Sign-in for server-side apps, via which I can authorize the server to connect to Google directly on behalf of my users. (auth2.grantOfflineAccess() on the client, which returns a code I can pass to getToken() on the server.)
I need both: I want to authenticate users via Google sign-in; and, I want to set up server auth so it can also work on behalf of the user.
I can't figure out how to do this with a single authentication flow. The closest I can get is to do the two in sequence: authenticate the user first with signIn(), and then (as needed), do a second pass via grantOfflineAccess(). This is problematic:
The user now has to go through two authentications back to back, which is awkward and makes it look like there's something broken with my app.
In order to avoid running afoul of popup blockers, I can't give them those two flows on top of each other; I have to do the first authentication, then supply a button to start the second authentication. This is super-awkward because now I have to explain why the first one wasn't enough.
Ideally there's some variant of signIn() that adds the offline access into the initial authentication flow and returns the code along with the usual tokens, but I'm not seeing anything. Help?
(Edit: Some advice I received elsewhere is to implement only flow #2, then use a secure cookie store some sort of user identifier that I check against the user account with each request. I can see that this would work functionally, but it basically means I'm rolling my own login system, which would seem to increase the chance I introduce bugs in a critical system.)

To add an API to an existing Google Sign-In integration the best option is to implement incremental authorization. For this, you need to use both google-auth-library and googleapis, so that users can have this workflow:
Authenticate with Google Sign-In.
Authorize your application to use their information to integrate it with a Google API. For instance, Google Calendar. 
For this, your client-side JavaScript for authentication might require some changes to request
offline access:
$('#signinButton').click(function() {
auth2.grantOfflineAccess().then(signInCallback);
});
In the response, you will have a JSON object with an authorization code:
{"code":"4/yU4cQZTMnnMtetyFcIWNItG32eKxxxgXXX-Z4yyJJJo.4qHskT-UtugceFc0ZRONyF4z7U4UmAI"}
After this, you can use the one-time code to exchange it for an access token and refresh token.
Here are some workflow details:
The code is your one-time code that your server can exchange for its own access token and refresh token. You can only obtain a refresh token after the user has been presented an authorization dialog requesting offline access. If you've specified the select-account prompt in the OfflineAccessOptions [...], you must store the refresh token that you retrieve for later use because subsequent exchanges will return null for the refresh token
Therefore, you should use google-auth-library to complete this workflow in the back-end. For this,
you'll use the authentication code to get a refresh token. However, as this is an offline workflow,
you also need to verify the integrity of the provided code as the documentation explains:
If you use Google Sign-In with an app or site that communicates with a backend server, you might need to identify the currently signed-in user on the server. To do so securely, after a user successfully signs in, send the user's ID token to your server using HTTPS. Then, on the server, verify the integrity of the ID token and use the user information contained in the token
The final function to get the refresh token that you should persist in your database might look like
this:
const { OAuth2Client } = require('google-auth-library');
/**
* Create a new OAuth2Client, and go through the OAuth2 content
* workflow. Return the refresh token.
*/
function getRefreshToken(code, scope) {
return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
// Create an oAuth client to authorize the API call. Secrets should be
// downloaded from the Google Developers Console.
const oAuth2Client = new OAuth2Client(
YOUR_CLIENT_ID,
YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET,
YOUR_REDIRECT_URL
);
// Generate the url that will be used for the consent dialog.
await oAuth2Client.generateAuthUrl({
access_type: 'offline',
scope,
});
// Verify the integrity of the idToken through the authentication
// code and use the user information contained in the token
const { tokens } = await client.getToken(code);
const ticket = await client.verifyIdToken({
idToken: tokens.id_token!,
audience: keys.web.client_secret,
});
idInfo = ticket.getPayload();
return tokens.refresh_token;
})
}
At this point, we've refactored the authentication workflow to support Google APIs. However, you haven't asked the user to authorize it yet. Since you also need to grant offline access, you should request additional permissions through your client-side application. Keep in mind that you already need an active session.
const googleOauth = gapi.auth2.getAuthInstance();
const newScope = "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/calendar"
googleOauth = auth2.currentUser.get();
googleOauth.grantOfflineAccess({ scope: newScope }).then(
function(success){
console.log(JSON.stringify({ message: "success", value: success }));
},
function(fail){
alert(JSON.stringify({message: "fail", value: fail}));
});
You're done with the front-end changes and you're only missing one step. To create a Google API's client in the back-end with the googleapis library, you need to use the refresh token from the previous step.
For a complete workflow with a Node.js back-end, you might find my gist helpful.

While authentication (sign in), you need to add "offline" access type (by default online) , so you will get a refresh token which you can use to get access token later without further user consent/authentication. You don't need to grant offline later, but only during signing in by adding the offline access_type. I don't know about platform.js but used "passport" npm module . I have also used "googleapis" npm module/library, this is official by Google.
https://developers.google.com/identity/protocols/oauth2/web-server
https://github.com/googleapis/google-api-nodejs-client
Check this:
https://github.com/googleapis/google-api-nodejs-client#generating-an-authentication-url
EDIT: You have a server side & you need to work on behalf of the user. You also want to use Google for signing in. You just need #2 Google Sign-in for server-side apps , why are you considering both #1 & #2 options.
I can think of #2 as the proper way based on your requirements. If you just want to signin, use basic scope such as email & profile (openid connect) to identify the user. And if you want user delegated permission (such as you want to automatically create an event in users calendar), just add the offline access_type during sign in. You can use only signing in for registered users & offline_access for new users.
Above is a single authentication flow.

How do I do anonymous Firebase logins which allow browser refresh?

I'm doing a javascript single-page app which allows people to log in, either via twitter or (for some use cases) anonymously.
A very important thing to figure out was how to let them reload the page -- this shouldn't force them to log back in!
I figured this out pretty quickly for the twitter login, and so it uses cookie-stored information to log back in (specifically, the user_id, oauth_token and oauth_token_secret).
However, I can't seem to make this work with the anonymous login facility.
I tried:
auth.login("anonymous", {
user_id: #get("userId"),
firebase_auth_token: #get("firebaseAuthToken")
});
but it doesn't work... I get a new anonymous user ID. I want to keep the same one for the duration of the user's browser session.
And yeah, I tried both user_id and id, firebaseAuthToken and firebase_auth_token.
Thanks!

By default, sessions are created any time you successfully log in a user, and last up until the session expiration time configured under the 'Auth' tab in Forge. This built-in sessioning applies to all Simple Login authentication types, and is automatic as long as local storage and cookies are available.
To resume a session, simply instantiate the FirebaseSimpleLogin object with a Firebase reference and callback. If a local session exists, the callback will be invoked with the same payload you would see if you had just logged the user in for the first time. Invoking the login method will always generate a brand new auth. flow regardless of current user authentication state or session.
Note that in anonymous auth, once a user session expires it cannot be recovered. This may change in the future or some additional functionality may be added to enable it, but it is currently only logged-in to once per user id.

Google Javascript Client library OAUTH asks for Offline Access permission, though it was never requested

My application interacts with Google with Javascript only. It asks for user profile access, email access and contacts management permissions.
Upon loading a page, the application checks if the user has already granted those permissions and obtains an access token if he had.
Here is some sample code:
var GoogleContacts = {
...
checkAuth: function(){
gapi.auth.authorize({
client_id: googleKeys.clientId,
scope: googleKeys.scopes,
immediate: true
},
jQuery.proxy(this.handleAuthResult, this)
);
},
askAuth: function(){
gapi.auth.authorize({
client_id: googleKeys.clientId,
scope: googleKeys.scopes,
immediate: false
},
jQuery.proxy(this.handleAuthResult, this)
);
}
...
}
....
function handleGoogleApiLoad(){
gapi.client.setApiKey(googleKeys.apiKey);
gapi.auth.init(function(){console.info('popup api ready')});
setTimeout(function(){GoogleContacts.checkAuth();}, 300);
}
....
$('#emailButton').click(function() {
if(!accessToken)
GoogleContacts.askAuth();
...
});
Now, if user comes for the first time, he is asked the correct permissions when he pressed the "Send email" button. When user reloads a page, the seamless permissions check returns failure and when user hits a "send email" button, we open the Google authorization popup again, and it now asks for Offline Access permission.
This seems incorrect as the JS api has no actual use for offline access.
Looks like this problem started after Google released the incremental auth feature: http://googleplusplatform.blogspot.co.il/2013/12/google-sign-in-improvements11.html
Is this a bug that will soon be fixed, or should we change the code somehow to not confuse our users with weird permission requests?
Update:
I have tried to use the plus api and gapi.auth.signIn() method but with the same result.
Apparently, this problem is scope-dependant, as when I use only the login scope, everything works as expected, but adding the Google Contacts access scope https:||www.google.com/m8/feeds/ always leads to the Offline Access request when entering page second time. Here is a fiddle to confirm this: http://jsfiddle.net/hjLM6/6/
This must be a bug and I really would like Google to deal with it soon, as it scares users away.

The immediate:false parameter in your askAuth method is the cause. The post that Abraham mentions explains the background.
The gapi.auth.authorize() method should generally be avoided in most cases now that the gapi.auth.signIn() method is available to handle programatic initiation of the authorization flow and also you should make use of the dynamic callbacks. The information on monitoring a user's session state explains how and when to get your sign-in callback function to fire and how you can use the values within the auth result object to determine if they've previously authorized your app, signed in (or out) of your app, or signed in (or out) of google.
Your checkAuth and askAuth functions would effectively be combined to check the status of the auth result object and act accordingly. Your email button click event would trigger instead gapi.auth.signIn() with the necessary parameters and scopes for your app.

I just had exactly the same issue with drive.readonly scope, for what it's worth the way I worked around it is by always calling authorize with immediate = false. This isn't that bad because when you do this for an already authorized user, Google will open the popup for a fraction of a second but then will immediately close it (apparently making use of the chance to open the popup in the browser event handler in case the user does need to authorize).
Curiously, for localhost server where I previously used immediate = true, I continue to see requests for offline access - but on the production server I haven't seen seen them so far, fingers crossed.

Is it possible to use an existing Facebook Connect session with Facebooker?

Update: Working as designed once I cleared my cookies. Doh!
I'm working on an app that for various reasons uses the Facebook
Javascript API to initiate a Facebook connect session. I'd like to be
able to use that session in a few rails methods using Facebooker.
The basic workflow is like this:
User goes to non-rails page and logs in to FB Connect via JS
User goes to another non-rails page and can view FB data such as
name, profile pic
User goes to a rails based page - rails uses session created in
step 1 to do some processing
My problem is in step 3. Facebooker detects the session fine, but when
I try to call a method like facebook_session.user.name I get: Session
key invalid or no longer valid
If I go back to the url in step two, my session still works fine.
So is this a fundamental incompatibility, or is there some data I can
send to facebooker so that I can hook into the correct session? Maybe
my facebooker.yml needs tweaking?
Any thoughts are appreciated.
My facebooker.yml
development:
api_key: redacted
secret_key: redacted
canvas_page_name: blah_blah
callback_url: http://test.domain:3000
pretty_errors: true
set_asset_host_to_callback_url: true
tunnel:
public_host_username:
public_host:
public_port: 4007
local_port: 3000
server_alive_interval: 0

Gah! Always clear your cookies before posting on the interweb people.
The problem was with an existing facebooker-based session that was still around in my browser.
All working now.