Basic file download example - node.js

Question

I have been struggling my brain reading the nodejs documentation for google-apis.
I gathered a pretty long list of examples, but any of them helps me to do what I want to do. I just want to download a file from my drive using node js.
I have set up the OAUTH and I get an access token using this code (source: http://masashi-k.blogspot.com.es/2013/07/accessing-to-my-google-drive-from-nodejs.html )
var googleDrive = require('google-drive');
var GoogleTokenProvider = require("refresh-token").GoogleTokenProvider,
async = require('async'),
request = require('request'),
_accessToken;
var tokenProvider = new GoogleTokenProvider({
'refresh_token': REFRESH_TOKEN,
'client_id' : CLIENT_ID,
'client_secret': CLIENT_SECRET
});
tokenProvider.getToken(function(err, access_token) {
console.log("Access Token=", access_token);
_accessToken = access_token;
});
But I don't know how to continue from here. I tried with things like this with no luck:
function listFiles(token, callback) {
googleDrive(token).files().get(callback)
}
function callback(err, response, body) {
if (err) return console.log('err', err)
console.log('response', response)
console.log('body', JSON.parse(body))
}
listFiles(_accessToken,callback);
I feel like I'm very close, but I need some help here.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

There are two ways of doing that, depending on what you want to download. There is a big difference between downloading native Google Doc files and normal files:
Docs have to be downloaded using files.export API method, providing proper mime type to convert doc into
Normal files can be downloaded using files.get method, providing correct flag if you want to download file data instead of metadata
I'd suggest using GoogleApis NodeJS library (https://github.com/google/google-api-nodejs-client)
Initializing Drive API:
var Google = require('googleapis');
var OAuth2 = Google.auth.OAuth2;
var oauth2Client = new OAuth2('clientId','clientSecret','redirectUrl');
oauth2Client.setCredentials({
access_token: 'accessTokenHere'
refresh_token: 'refreshTokenHere'
});
var drive = Google.drive({
version: 'v3',
auth: this.oauth2Client
});
Importing file:
drive.files.get({
fileId: fileId,
alt: 'media' // THIS IS IMPORTANT PART! WITHOUT THIS YOU WOULD GET ONLY METADATA
}, function(err, result) {
console.log(result); // Binary file content here
});
Exporting native Google docs (you have to provide mime type for conversion):
drive.files.export({
fileId: fileId,
mimeType: 'application/pdf' // Provide mimetype of your liking from list of supported ones
}, function(err, result) {
console.log(result); // Binary file content here
});
Maybe it will help someone after so much time ;)

Answer 2

Take a look at the officially supported NodeJS client library for Google APIs at https://github.com/google/google-api-nodejs-client
The code required to get a file from Drive will be similar to that code at the bottom of the README used for inserting a file into Google Drive. You can also test your parameters to the API by using the API Explorer: https://developers.google.com/apis-explorer/#p/drive/v2/drive.files.get
Here's an example call to get a file from Google Drive:
client
.drive.files.get({ fileId: 'xxxx' })
.execute(function(err, file) {
// do something with file here
});