How to send POST requests to Google Docs API for permission management

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1

I’m building a web application that needs to work with Google Docs API. The problem is that Zend_Gdata library doesn’t include built-in functions for modifying document sharing permissions, so I have to make direct POST requests.

I found the API documentation showing this request format:

POST /feeds/default/private/full/document_id/acl HTTP/1.1
Host: docs.google.com
GData-Version: 3.0
Authorization: <auth_token_here>

<entry xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:gAcl='http://schemas.google.com/acl/2007'>
  <category scheme='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#kind'
    term='http://schemas.google.com/acl/2007#accessRule'/>
  <gAcl:role value='editor'/>
  <gAcl:scope type='user' value='[email protected]'/>
</entry>

I’m confused about the implementation part. What’s the best way to execute this POST request in PHP? Should I use cURL or does PHP have some other built-in method? Can someone show me how to structure this properly?

Any help would be great!

2

I’ve dealt with this exact problem doing document automation. Yeah, the cURL setup matters, but don’t forget the GData-Version header - you need 3.0 for ACL stuff to work. Here’s what saved me tons of time: test your XML structure in Postman first before jumping into PHP. Google’s picky about namespace declarations - get them wrong and the request just fails silently. Start with regular Docs files too. PDFs and imported files behave differently with permissions, so don’t complicate things early on. Google’s error messages are useless when your XML is broken, so that Postman step is clutch.

3

I dealt with Google Docs API permissions last year and hit the same problems. Use cURL for PHP - you need tight control over headers and request formatting. The XML payload is the real pain point. Make sure you’re escaping it properly when you build the string variable. Here’s what tripped me up: the document_id in your URL path has to be the actual Google Docs resource ID, not whatever’s showing in your browser URL. And check your OAuth token has the right scope for ACL changes - you’ll get weird 403 errors even when your request looks perfect.

4

definitely go with cURL! just remember to set content-type to application/atom+xml n get your headers on point. i messed up the auth token format too at first. also, use the real document id in the url, not the sharing link.