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I asked this question two weeks ago (Unable to recover Google API project and "This client ID is globally unique and is already in use.") and was immediately approached by a Google representative who promised to get back to me. Unfortunately this Google employee vanished in thin air or was sucked into a black hole or something. He hasn't been on SO since September 30th and all my efforts to get in touch have failed. I'm posting here again in then hope that some other Google employee might answer and follow through.

The question once again:

I've been working as a consultant on an Android project that uses Google oAuth2 to authenticate and identify it's users. The Android project is in production and available for download on Google Play. The oAuth client ids and the entire Google API project was setup by me using a Google Apps e-mail address setup in my name on the client's domain.

Since the project has been released and my work with the client is finished my e-mail address has been deactivated and subsequently deleted (or so it seems, the client claims to not being able to recreate it). Since my e-mail account was set as the owner of the API project the deletion of my e-mail address has resulted in the deactivation (or deletion) of the API project as well. This has of course seriously crippled the app in question.

To get things up and running again a new e-mail address was set up for me on the client's domain and I created a new API project. The problem is that I'm unable to create the oAuth client ids since the packagename and SHA1 key are the same as for the app already live. I get the "This client ID is globally unique and is already in use" message and I seem to be stuck in a very awkward situation. I see a couple of possible solutions but I'm not sure how to proceed:

  1. Reactivate the original e-mail address in the hope that the API project is still linked to that account

  2. Reactivate the Google API project with the help of a Google engineer and assign it to an e-mail account on the client's domain

  3. Delete the client ids from some Google database with the help of a Google engineer and setup a new API project and release a new version of the app.

  4. Worst case: accept the loss, change package name, release a new app and kindly ask users to migrate to the new app.

I've read that Google monitors the google-oauth tag here on SO and I hope to get some help either from the SO community or Google itself. Many thanks in advance!

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britzl
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  • 1. If your account was disabled and then deleted, the API project you owned previously will become an orphan project and will be purged. You won't be able to retrieve it even if the email is re-activiated. 2. Same as #1. If the project is purged, there is no way to get it back. 3. I don't think this is possible. 4. You best bet in this case. – Emily Oct 18 '13 at 17:43
  • Why is #3 impossible? It must be easy enough to verify that the API project the client ids belonged to have been deleted and thus rendered useless. There's evidence on SO that it's been done before: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/16874983/api-console-data-corrupted-cannot-recreate-client-id-for-a-particular-package-a . I acknowledge that Google can't be running around helping every careless dev in the world but not deleting the client ids of a deleted API project is really a mistake made by Google, not me. – britzl Oct 19 '13 at 12:19

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