title: Using googlecl with a non-Gmail address
body: <p>I am trying to build a small toolbox of scripts such that I can automate some tasks involving Google contacts, calendar and so on.  Most of the work is already done by means of the <code>googlecl</code> project, which looks very promising.</p>
  
  <p>As far as I understand the process, <code>googlecl</code> needs to request an authentication ticket from Google by means of OAuth.  Admittedly, I have only a sketchy notion of what is going on there, but that’s something that Wikipedia will help me solve.</p>
  
  <p><strong>Here’s the catch:</strong>  My Google account uses a non-Gmail address (let it be <code>vucar@example.invalid</code> for the sake of this discussion).  The account was created back in the old days when Google didn’t force GMail down people’s throats who have no use for it.  <code>googlecl</code> will direct me to <code>https://www.google.com/accounts/OAuthAuthorizeToken?oauth_token=…&amp;hd=example.invalid</code> to complete the OAuth handshake.  Google will then tell me that ‘the domain name has not been signed up for Google Apps’.  Which is correct.</p>
  
  <p>If I <em>don’t</em> supply my user ID to <code>googlecl</code>, then the URL reads <code>…&amp;hd=default</code>.  Google will accept the OAuth request, granting whichever permissions needed to my locally running <code>googlecl</code>, but then <code>googlecl</code> will complain that the token was issued to a different user ID than for the user ID that was requested.  Which of course is also correct.</p>
  
  <p>I’ve read through <a href="https://support.google.com/a/answer/33419" rel="nofollow">https://support.google.com/a/answer/33419</a>, which in turn redirects me to <a href="http://www.google.com/a" rel="nofollow">http://www.google.com/a</a> in order to ‘to sign up your domain for Google Apps’.  Apparently, if my Google account uses a domain different from @gmail.com, then I am a business user and need to <em>purchase</em> Google Apps for my domain—to get, amonst a truckload of other stuff, my domain connected to GMail, the polar opposite of what I wanted to have by having that ‘foreign’ domain in the first place.</p>
  
  <p>I have to admit that I am stymied.  I understand what OAuth in this case is used for, but I fail to grasp the byzantine reasoning at Google’s.  I do not believe that I want Google Apps for my domain, and I <em>especially</em> do not want to hand over my emails or anything else to Google.  I merely want to access and modify my data at Google’s, with my user ID happening not to end in @gmail.com.</p>
  
  <p>Is it strictly required that I purchase <em>Google Apps for Work</em> for such a configuration?  The contacts, calendars and so forth is already at Google’s, and used from both Google’s web site and Android clients.  The only thing new to the mix is API access.</p>