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We feel your pain at Nextcloud. Our team at Everfind (unified search across Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.) has spent the past year fighting for the *drive.read

We feel your pain at Nextcloud. Our team at Everfind (unified search across Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.) has spent the past year fighting for the *drive.readonly* scope simply so we can download files, run OCR, and index their full-text for users. Google keeps telling us to make do with *drive.file* + *drive.metadata.readonly*, which breaks continuous discovery and cripples search results for any new or updated document. Bottom line: Googles "least-privilege" rhetoric sounds noble, but in practice it gives Big Tech first-party apps privileged access while forcing independent vendors to ship half-working products - or get kicked out of the Play Store. The result is users lose features and choices, and small devs burn countless hours arguing with a copy-paste policy bot.

theodric 1y ago
Sounds like it's time for an(other) antitrust lawsuit. At least Nextcloud is based in Europe, which has recently shown an appetite to stand up to tech giants on some things.
- HPsquared 1y ago
  The question to ask is: do Google apps have an advantage here over others?
  - donatzsky 1y ago
    I'd be surprised if they have to go through the same review process as everyone else. And even if they do, the reviewers are likely to give them a pass because it's Google.
  - em-bee 1y ago
    they have the advantage that they can shape the API to their needs. yes, you can argue that google apps have the same limitations as other apps. but google defines the limitations. just because google doesn't need a feature, it doesn't mean that no one else needs or should have that feature. so google is able to define features that fit their business model, and they prevent anyone else from offering a different feature set. they own the platform and compete in it. that in itself is an advantage. to not have an advantage either google must not compete with apps on the platform and or they should relinquish their ownership of the platform.
    - monegator 1y ago
      Or simply put the implementation behind a permission that they will give to themselves and practically never give to you. I second the fighting against a copy-paste bot. It took a couple of weeks of multiple daily requests before we got to exchange emails with some sort of human being, which was almost as useless until we gave in and abandoned
  - brigandish 1y ago
    According to the article, and according to many of the comments here, yes they do.
    - observationist 1y ago
      And unicorns shit rainbows, and we're all going to win the lottery tomorrow. Nothing google does is in good faith. They're a corporation - a bundle of regulations, laws, rules, and incentives executed on a mixed substrate of human brains and digital computers, beyond the control and sensibilities that govern individual rationality, seeking to maximize profit. If it's not illegal, they'll do it, and if it is illegal, they'll still do it if the penalty is less than the profit. We have to stop pretending corporations are people. We have to stop pretending like CEOs can affect what these companies do - the only way to restrain them is laws with teeth. If you want CEOs to behave, enforce laws that come with jail time and lost fortunes. Otherwise, this is what we live with.
      - brigandish 1y ago
        Are you sure you were supposed to reply to my comment?
  - yndoendo 1y ago
    I will go with yes for $500. From an Pixel 5a perspective. The camera application provided by Google will only open Google's gallery application and will not open the one the end user sets as system default. User must exit the camera application and manually open the gallery application they really want to use. One of the reasons I am looking forward for a company that provides a quality Linux base phone. That is the only way to get the system configuration and application select the end user really wants. Google and Apple are for profit prison Wardens with their mobile OSes. PS. Has anyone ever studied the economic, resource, and power waste of system bloat-ware?
    - spookie 1y ago
      Man, Linux phones are a mess, you do well to wait. I'm eyeing Sailfish but even then I'm hesitant, anything else is a big no no (from experience).
    - codethief 1y ago
      > One of the reasons I am looking forward for a company that provides a quality Linux base phone. What exactly is that going to change with respect to the camera app? I'm as annoyed by Google Camera's behavior as you are but already today we can download FOSS camera apps for Android that will open the gallery app of our choice just fine. It's just that those apps are not quite as good as Google's app. Exchanging the underlying Android layer for regular Linux is not going to change anything about that.
      - yndoendo 1y ago
        I did just that for the longest time, replaced the camera app so it would use the gallery application set to default on the system. This is just one example of why I disdain Google and Apple. There is now way to improve the security of your device. End user should have the ability to block network connects to and from select networks, infrastructures, and applications. Example an application like ZoneAlarm or Open Snitch. The internals of SMS on Android are wrapped in an API where a simple SQLite database would work and allow quick easy backup. Nope, need to use a 3rd party program instead of just copying files. I also support the idea of Convergence to allow the device to be used a standard computer by connecting and external monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Being able to reclaim the storage you bought and remove the bloat-ware. There should be zero reason I must retain your email client when I will never use it. Until Apple and Google back track down their locked in path, Linux or BSD phone is the only way to take back the "Smart" in SmartPhone.
throw7 1y ago
This sounds exactly what anti-trust laws are for.
- graemep 1y ago
  It does not look like the laws are working! Enforcement is erratic, fines are small, and the incentives to do things like this are strong. They have had this problem for five months. How many customers have they lost in this time?
- hkt 1y ago
  Regrettably competition law doesn't really work like this: in the US it doesn't kick in until consumer prices are affected, and in the EU it is a combination of consumer prices plus market fairness. Market fairness could be for technical stuff like this but to the best of my knowledge it hasn't done anything so fine grained. The only example that comes to mind is when Microsoft were forced to show alternative browsers in Windows. No idea if they still have to do that or not, but it is a much higher level thing that is much more readily understood.
nolist_policy 1y ago
Hmm, AFAIK drive.readonly is a Google Drive thing. TFA is talking about local file access, not Google Drive access.
- mbrumlow 1y ago
  Hello, it’s the same overall issue just on different platforms.
stavros 1y ago
As a user, this should be up to me to decide, not up to Google. However, I do find it odd that Apple can get away with it much more, because Apple's customers generally have more of a "save us from ourselves" mentality.
- TheNewsIsHere 1y ago
  Apple’s implementation of enabling access to files is entirely different. I actually much prefer it because it sidesteps the self-dealing permissions bomb that Google just set off. In iOS, applications can use the File Provider API to present themselves in the Files app. You can move/copy/delete data there using the normal human interface constructs native to iOS, including mouse support and keyboard shortcuts on iPadOS. Apps can also present the same directory internally (inside the app). Cloud-backed applications can then do useful things like materialization, eviction, and dataless file presence. It doesn’t allow standing access to the entire filesystem, though. iOS only has support for applications reading outside their sandbox if the apps are from the same developer, and then they can call a pooled storage location for all apps that share the same “Team ID” (e.g., top level developer account/organization). It’s actually far easier (functionally) to grant access to your entire photo library, so for example you can have an app query and backup your photo library. “True” filesystem-wide backup requires hooking into the iOS backup/MobileFile hooks. Apple isn’t as hostile to third parties doing that as Google is to anyone accessing their own device data. But the process is more cumbersome by far.
  - nolist_policy 1y ago
    > In iOS, applications can use the File Provider API to present themselves in the Files app. You can move/copy/delete data there using the normal human interface constructs native to iOS, including mouse support and keyboard shortcuts on iPadOS. > Apps can also present the same directory internally (inside the app). Cloud-backed applications can then do useful things like materialization, eviction, and dataless file presence. In Android apps can do all this with the SAF API. More importantly, on Android the user can give multiple apps access to the same directory, allowing apps to work together with files. iOS doesn't allow this AFAIK.
jmathai 1y ago
It's likely a lot less about giving Google's first-party apps privileged access than it is a super low priority for the team to allocate engineering effort to. I was a PM in Google Workspace for several years. It's a lot less nefarious than it probably seems. Decisions are optimized for revenue and other features (especially for enterprise customers) are going to be much higher priority. Companies choosing to focus on enterprise revenue (which is basically all of them since like 2012) do so at the cost of end-user satisfaction.
- cess11 1y ago
  If it looked as nefarious as it is on the inside they would have roughly zero employees.
- arp242 1y ago
  I don't doubt what you're saying, but whatever the reason, the end result is the same: Google Apps have a "first-party apps privileged access".
- cycomanic 1y ago
  They removed the permission for nextcloud, that seems they actually spend resources on removing the permissions. The minimal "spend no resources" approach would have left nextcloud with access.
  - jmathai 1y ago
    I can say with some certainty that folks inside of Google are not sitting around talking about nextcloud. More likely is some paydown of technical debt or effort to simplify leading to the removal of that permission and deciding the ramifications are acceptable. Boring stuff.
- apitman 1y ago
  I believe it. Most people would be better served paying a local company $20/mo to offer the equivalent of google services using open protocols. Unfortunately such a marketplace doesn't exist, but I believe it will eventually.
mindslight 1y ago
Perhaps feature-gate the things that are broken for Google builds, so you can have the functionality available in other channels? Personally, I prioritize installing apps from F-Droid over PlayStore.
- cycomanic 1y ago
  The post is alluding to the fact that nextcloud is already doing this (the point to advanced users can install from f-droid)
- apitman 1y ago
  We need something like F-droid but with proprietary apps to get popular.

theodric 1y ago

Sounds like it's time for an(other) antitrust lawsuit. At least Nextcloud is based in Europe, which has recently shown an appetite to stand up to tech giants on some things.

HPsquared 1y ago
The question to ask is: do Google apps have an advantage here over others?
- donatzsky 1y ago
  I'd be surprised if they have to go through the same review process as everyone else. And even if they do, the reviewers are likely to give them a pass because it's Google.
- em-bee 1y ago
  they have the advantage that they can shape the API to their needs. yes, you can argue that google apps have the same limitations as other apps. but google defines the limitations. just because google doesn't need a feature, it doesn't mean that no one else needs or should have that feature. so google is able to define features that fit their business model, and they prevent anyone else from offering a different feature set. they own the platform and compete in it. that in itself is an advantage. to not have an advantage either google must not compete with apps on the platform and or they should relinquish their ownership of the platform.
  - monegator 1y ago
    Or simply put the implementation behind a permission that they will give to themselves and practically never give to you. I second the fighting against a copy-paste bot. It took a couple of weeks of multiple daily requests before we got to exchange emails with some sort of human being, which was almost as useless until we gave in and abandoned
- brigandish 1y ago
  According to the article, and according to many of the comments here, yes they do.
  - observationist 1y ago
    And unicorns shit rainbows, and we're all going to win the lottery tomorrow. Nothing google does is in good faith. They're a corporation - a bundle of regulations, laws, rules, and incentives executed on a mixed substrate of human brains and digital computers, beyond the control and sensibilities that govern individual rationality, seeking to maximize profit. If it's not illegal, they'll do it, and if it is illegal, they'll still do it if the penalty is less than the profit. We have to stop pretending corporations are people. We have to stop pretending like CEOs can affect what these companies do - the only way to restrain them is laws with teeth. If you want CEOs to behave, enforce laws that come with jail time and lost fortunes. Otherwise, this is what we live with.
    - brigandish 1y ago
      Are you sure you were supposed to reply to my comment?
- yndoendo 1y ago
  I will go with yes for $500. From an Pixel 5a perspective. The camera application provided by Google will only open Google's gallery application and will not open the one the end user sets as system default. User must exit the camera application and manually open the gallery application they really want to use. One of the reasons I am looking forward for a company that provides a quality Linux base phone. That is the only way to get the system configuration and application select the end user really wants. Google and Apple are for profit prison Wardens with their mobile OSes. PS. Has anyone ever studied the economic, resource, and power waste of system bloat-ware?
  - spookie 1y ago
    Man, Linux phones are a mess, you do well to wait. I'm eyeing Sailfish but even then I'm hesitant, anything else is a big no no (from experience).
  - codethief 1y ago
    > One of the reasons I am looking forward for a company that provides a quality Linux base phone. What exactly is that going to change with respect to the camera app? I'm as annoyed by Google Camera's behavior as you are but already today we can download FOSS camera apps for Android that will open the gallery app of our choice just fine. It's just that those apps are not quite as good as Google's app. Exchanging the underlying Android layer for regular Linux is not going to change anything about that.
    - yndoendo 1y ago
      I did just that for the longest time, replaced the camera app so it would use the gallery application set to default on the system. This is just one example of why I disdain Google and Apple. There is now way to improve the security of your device. End user should have the ability to block network connects to and from select networks, infrastructures, and applications. Example an application like ZoneAlarm or Open Snitch. The internals of SMS on Android are wrapped in an API where a simple SQLite database would work and allow quick easy backup. Nope, need to use a 3rd party program instead of just copying files. I also support the idea of Convergence to allow the device to be used a standard computer by connecting and external monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Being able to reclaim the storage you bought and remove the bloat-ware. There should be zero reason I must retain your email client when I will never use it. Until Apple and Google back track down their locked in path, Linux or BSD phone is the only way to take back the "Smart" in SmartPhone.

throw7 1y ago

This sounds exactly what anti-trust laws are for.

graemep 1y ago
It does not look like the laws are working! Enforcement is erratic, fines are small, and the incentives to do things like this are strong. They have had this problem for five months. How many customers have they lost in this time?
hkt 1y ago
Regrettably competition law doesn't really work like this: in the US it doesn't kick in until consumer prices are affected, and in the EU it is a combination of consumer prices plus market fairness. Market fairness could be for technical stuff like this but to the best of my knowledge it hasn't done anything so fine grained. The only example that comes to mind is when Microsoft were forced to show alternative browsers in Windows. No idea if they still have to do that or not, but it is a much higher level thing that is much more readily understood.

nolist_policy 1y ago

Hmm, AFAIK drive.readonly is a Google Drive thing. TFA is talking about local file access, not Google Drive access.

mbrumlow 1y ago
Hello, it’s the same overall issue just on different platforms.

stavros 1y ago

As a user, this should be up to me to decide, not up to Google. However, I do find it odd that Apple can get away with it much more, because Apple's customers generally have more of a "save us from ourselves" mentality.

TheNewsIsHere 1y ago
Apple’s implementation of enabling access to files is entirely different. I actually much prefer it because it sidesteps the self-dealing permissions bomb that Google just set off. In iOS, applications can use the File Provider API to present themselves in the Files app. You can move/copy/delete data there using the normal human interface constructs native to iOS, including mouse support and keyboard shortcuts on iPadOS. Apps can also present the same directory internally (inside the app). Cloud-backed applications can then do useful things like materialization, eviction, and dataless file presence. It doesn’t allow standing access to the entire filesystem, though. iOS only has support for applications reading outside their sandbox if the apps are from the same developer, and then they can call a pooled storage location for all apps that share the same “Team ID” (e.g., top level developer account/organization). It’s actually far easier (functionally) to grant access to your entire photo library, so for example you can have an app query and backup your photo library. “True” filesystem-wide backup requires hooking into the iOS backup/MobileFile hooks. Apple isn’t as hostile to third parties doing that as Google is to anyone accessing their own device data. But the process is more cumbersome by far.
- nolist_policy 1y ago
  > In iOS, applications can use the File Provider API to present themselves in the Files app. You can move/copy/delete data there using the normal human interface constructs native to iOS, including mouse support and keyboard shortcuts on iPadOS. > Apps can also present the same directory internally (inside the app). Cloud-backed applications can then do useful things like materialization, eviction, and dataless file presence. In Android apps can do all this with the SAF API. More importantly, on Android the user can give multiple apps access to the same directory, allowing apps to work together with files. iOS doesn't allow this AFAIK.

jmathai 1y ago

It's likely a lot less about giving Google's first-party apps privileged access than it is a super low priority for the team to allocate engineering effort to. I was a PM in Google Workspace for several years. It's a lot less nefarious than it probably seems. Decisions are optimized for revenue and other features (especially for enterprise customers) are going to be much higher priority. Companies choosing to focus on enterprise revenue (which is basically all of them since like 2012) do so at the cost of end-user satisfaction.

cess11 1y ago
If it looked as nefarious as it is on the inside they would have roughly zero employees.
arp242 1y ago
I don't doubt what you're saying, but whatever the reason, the end result is the same: Google Apps have a "first-party apps privileged access".
cycomanic 1y ago
They removed the permission for nextcloud, that seems they actually spend resources on removing the permissions. The minimal "spend no resources" approach would have left nextcloud with access.
- jmathai 1y ago
  I can say with some certainty that folks inside of Google are not sitting around talking about nextcloud. More likely is some paydown of technical debt or effort to simplify leading to the removal of that permission and deciding the ramifications are acceptable. Boring stuff.
apitman 1y ago
I believe it. Most people would be better served paying a local company $20/mo to offer the equivalent of google services using open protocols. Unfortunately such a marketplace doesn't exist, but I believe it will eventually.

mindslight 1y ago

Perhaps feature-gate the things that are broken for Google builds, so you can have the functionality available in other channels? Personally, I prioritize installing apps from F-Droid over PlayStore.

cycomanic 1y ago
The post is alluding to the fact that nextcloud is already doing this (the point to advanced users can install from f-droid)
apitman 1y ago
We need something like F-droid but with proprietary apps to get popular.