googledrive

name	googledrive
description	How to use the Google Drive connector's tools — finding files and folders, reading metadata, downloading content, creating text files and folders, moving and copying, and sharing. Use when the user works with Google Drive, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, files, folders, or shared documents.

You are using the Google Drive connector (via Composio). Its tools act on the connected user's Drive. Apply this guidance whenever you touch Drive.

Find the file first

• Resolve a human reference ("the Q3 deck", "the budget folder") into a file id or folder id before reading, downloading, moving, copying, or sharing. Don't guess ids — find, then act by id.
• Use the find/search tool to locate files and the find-folder tool to locate folders. Search supports Drive query syntax, not just keywords: filter on name (name contains 'budget', name = 'Report'), mimeType (mimeType = 'application/vnd.google-apps.document', mimeType contains 'image/'), fullText contains 'phrase' for body content, plus trashed = false, sharedWithMe, starred, and modified-date filters. Combine terms with and. Escape single quotes in names with a backslash.
• Scope to a folder when you can (pass the parent/folder id) instead of searching all of Drive and filtering yourself. Multiple files can share a name — confirm the right one (by parent, owner, or modified date) before acting.

Files, folders, and types

• A folder is just a file with mimeType application/vnd.google-apps.folder. Use the create-folder tool for folders; reparent a file by moving it.
• Google-native docs (Docs/Sheets/Slides, application/vnd.google-apps.*) have no raw bytes — downloading them requires an export mimeType (e.g. PDF, DOCX, CSV). Binary/uploaded files download directly. If a download fails on a native doc, you likely need to specify an export format.
• Get-metadata returns mimeType, parents, trashed, owners, and size — check it to learn an item's type and where it lives before you act.

Creating and organizing

• Create text-backed files with the create-file-from-text tool (give it a name, text content, and optionally a parent folder id). This connector's create surface is text/upload — it does not author rich native Docs formatting.
• Move changes a file's parent (it relocates, it does not duplicate). Copy duplicates. Don't move when the user wanted a copy, or vice versa.
• New files land in "My Drive" root unless you pass a parent id — set the parent at creation rather than creating then moving.

Sharing

• Sharing is done by creating a permission on a file id: a type (user, group, domain, anyone) + role (reader, commenter, writer, owner) + the target (email address or domain). type: anyone makes a file publicly accessible — use it only when the user explicitly asks for a public/shareable link.
• Granting writer/owner or domain-wide access is a meaningful exposure. Confirm the recipient and role before sharing; prefer the least role that satisfies the ask.

Care

• Moving and sharing are immediately visible to others with access, and changing ownership or revoking access can lock people out. Confirm the target file and the scope before any move or permission change; never bulk-share or bulk-move without explicit scope.
• A file "not found" may simply not be shared with the connected account rather than deleted — say so instead of inventing it.
• Large Drives: page through search results rather than requesting everything, and summarize. Match on parent/owner/date to disambiguate same-named files.