Firestore Admin Not Authenticating on Electron App

Question

I'm creating an electron app as an interface for administrators. Currently using Real-time database and firestore. I'm using the firebase admin sdk with a local .json service account file to connect to the realtime database and perform all un-restricted read/write operations. Everything works as expected. However, when attempting to read/write to the Firestore database, I receive an error:

You need to pass auth instance to use gRPC-fallback client in browser. Use OAuth2Client from google-auth-library.

I did read online that other people had a similar issue and I've tried the following:

• npm rebuild
• install the @grcp/grcp packages
• install the google-auth-library

Unfortunately, I still get the same response. I also get a lot of the following warning messages (each referencing a different js file), not sure if they are related:

DevTools failed to load SourceMap: Could not parse content for file:///Users/anaroca/Desktop/FCF-Admin/node_modules/@google-cloud/firestore/build/src/pool.js.map: Unexpected end of JSON input

This is how I have initiated the admin app:

var admin = require("firebase-admin");
var serviceAccount = require("./secret.json");
app = admin.initializeApp({
  credential: admin.credential.cert(serviceAccount),
  databaseURL: "https://project-name.firebaseio.com",
  projectId: 'project-name'
});

Any help is appreciated.

EDIT: After getting the answer from Dallas, I found this stackoverflow that was a really elegant solution to my problem.

How to use Admin SDK with limited privileges on Firestore?

Answer 1

Firestore is new and so there are a few differences from realtime.

If you wish to implement in electron, react, or another front end framework you need to use the JavaScript SDK.

If you wish to implement Firestore on a secured server using Node.JS, c# etc you need to use the Admin SDK.

This is how I would implement using electron. Create a firebase.js file as such. Use babel to transpile if you want to use newest syntax.

import firebase from 'firebase/app';
import 'firebase/firestore';

const firebaseConfig = {
  apiKey: 'key',
  authDomain: 'domain.firebaseapp.com',
  databaseURL: 'https://domain.firebaseio.com',
  projectId: 'project1234',
  storageBucket: 'myapp.appspot.com',
  messagingSenderId: '123456789',
  appId: 'ID',
  measurementId: 'MID',
};

firebase.initializeApp(firebaseConfig);

export const firestore = firebase.firestore();

export default firebase;

Then implement as such for any place you need to access the DB

// The firebase.js file you created earlier.
import { firestore } from './firebase';

    const getPost = async (poss) => {
      const snapshot = await firestore.collection('location/of/post').get();
      const myPosts = snapshot.docs.map(collectIdsAndDocs);
      return myPosts;
    };

    const createPost = async (post) => {
      const docRef = await firestore.collection('location/of/post').add(post);
      const doc = await docRef.get();
      return doc;
    };

    createPost({ Title: 'My First Post', Content: 'My content' });
    getPost();

To secure the Database and grant admin privileges, head over to the project settings and assign users roles. You should only need to implement a service account with the Admin-SDK if you have a server that cleans up old data or users or serves another autonomous purpose.