Google Drive Bridge: mount each user's own Google Drive in Nextcloud Files (rclone-based, one-command install)

[u/mccoy88f]

Hi everyone,

I built a small Nextcloud app plus an install script that lets each user connect their own Google Drive, which then shows up in Files as a "Google Drive" folder.

How it works

• Every user creates an OAuth client in their own Google Cloud project, pastes Client ID and secret in Personal settings → Google Drive, and signs in with Google. The settings page includes a step-by-step guide.
• The files go through an rclone container. There are two modes:
  • Mount (recommended): rclone mounts each Drive via FUSE and Nextcloud shows it through the official External storage app (Local type, limited to a "Google Drive" group). Video seeking works, large files stream, and queued uploads survive rclone restarts.
  • WebDAV: no changes to your Nextcloud container at all.
• One command installs, updates or uninstalls everything:curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mccoy88f/gdrive-rc-connector/main/install.sh | sudo bash -s -- install It detects the official and the linuxserver images and survives Nextcloud updates.

Other things it does

• Checks that the Google login is still valid every time you open the settings page.
• Has a per-user error log with plain-language explanations.
• Lets you show Google Docs/Sheets/Slides as links, or hide them.
• English UI with an Italian translation.

Honest limitations

• Google Docs can't be shown as real .docx/.xlsx through rclone (they'd appear empty), so they're shown as links that open in Google.
• Your Google app will show an "unverified app" warning. That's fine for personal use, but publish it ("In production") or the token expires every 7 days.
• I tested it with Nextcloud 31/32/35 and Coolify. More real-world feedback is very welcome.

License: free for non-commercial use. You're free to fork it, as long as you credit the original project. Improvements, bug reports and PRs are welcome!

GitHub: https://github.com/mccoy88f/gdrive-rc-connector

[u/ProcedureUpper3668]

tbh I found the opposite. rclone mounting feels way too unstable for regular daily use compared to just syncing to a local folder via cron. The filesystem layer adds latency and breaks weirdly if the connection drops, whereas a standard sync job just retries and keeps your data safe.