Google Slides

Google Slides

This connector reads and edits Google Slides through the Google Slides API v1 (https://slides.googleapis.com/v1): it reads a presentation as text slide by slide, renders slides as images, creates presentations, adds, copies and reorders slides, inserts and replaces text, adds text boxes and images. It works with personal Google accounts and Google Workspace, on every presentation the authorizing Google account can open.

Setup (one-time, about 10 minutes)

1. Open https://console.cloud.google.com, pick or create a project, then APIs & Services → Library → enable Google Slides API.
2. APIs & Services → OAuth consent screen: choose Internal if you are on Google Workspace (simplest), otherwise External. For External, set the publishing status to In production: while an app is in Testing, Google revokes its refresh tokens after 7 days and the connector stops working every week. For your own use, the "unverified app" warning can be clicked through.
3. APIs & Services → Credentials → Create credentials → OAuth client ID → application type Web application → add the authorized redirect URI <your AnythingMCP URL>/api/mcp-oauth/callback (on AnythingMCP Cloud: https://cloud.anythingmcp.com/api/mcp-oauth/callback).
4. Paste the client ID and secret into GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID and GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET and install the connector.
5. On the connector page, click Authorize with Provider and sign in with the Google account whose presentations the AI should use. The refresh token is stored encrypted and access tokens are renewed automatically.

One Google client for all Google connectors: the same Cloud project and OAuth client can serve every Google connector (Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, Google Sheets, Google Docs, Google Slides, Google Forms, Google Contacts, Google Tasks, Search Console, Analytics, Ads). Enable each API in that project, reuse the same GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID and GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET, and authorize each connector once: each one asks only for its own scopes.

Scope: the connector asks for https://www.googleapis.com/auth/presentations (read and edit every presentation the user can open). It does not include Google Drive, so it cannot list, search, share or delete presentation files. For a read-only setup, change the scope to https://www.googleapis.com/auth/presentations.readonly in the connector's OAuth settings, authorize again, and disable google_slides_create_presentation, google_slides_add_slide, google_slides_duplicate_object, google_slides_move_slides, google_slides_insert_text, google_slides_add_text_box, google_slides_replace_all_text and google_slides_create_image.

Switched off at install: google_slides_delete_object and google_slides_batch_update, which can delete slides and content. Turn them on per tool if the AI needs them.

Before every change: tell the user what will be created, changed or deleted and in which presentation, and wait for a yes. Edits are saved at once and seen by everyone who has the file open.

Finding a presentation: the id is the long string in the link, https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/<id>/edit. To find one by name, use the Google Drive connector's gdrive_search_files with mimeType = 'application/vnd.google-apps.presentation' and name contains '...', or ask the user for the link.

Reading

• google_slides_get_presentation returns each slide's objectId, its elements (objectId, type, text) and speaker notes with their notesObjectId. type is the placeholder type (TITLE, CENTERED_TITLE, SUBTITLE, BODY) or the shape type (TEXT_BOX, RECTANGLE...), or TABLE, IMAGE, VIDEO, LINE, SHEETS_CHART, GROUP. Text inside groups is not shown; read the group's children with google_slides_get_page. Formatting is left out, and the answer is cut at 200 KB.
• google_slides_get_page adds positions and sizes. They are in EMU: 12,700 EMU = 1 pt, 914,400 EMU = 1 inch; the element's real size is size times the transform scale.
• google_slides_get_page_thumbnail returns a PNG link valid for about 30 minutes; anyone with the link can open it.

Editing

• A new deck from google_slides_create_presentation has one title slide; the reply lists its placeholders. Add slides with google_slides_add_slide, read the new slide with google_slides_get_page and fill its placeholders with google_slides_insert_text.
• Templates: google_slides_replace_all_text replaces placeholders such as [Customer name] everywhere (or on page_ids only), keeping the formatting. To build one slide per item, copy a template slide with google_slides_duplicate_object, then replace with page_ids set to the copy.
• Speaker notes: insert into the slide's notesObjectId with google_slides_insert_text.
• google_slides_add_text_box and google_slides_create_image place content in points from the top-left corner; a 16:9 slide is 720 x 405 pt. Images must be public URLs (PNG, JPEG, GIF).
• objectIds you choose must have 5 to 50 characters (letters, digits, _, -, :) and be unique in the presentation.
• google_slides_batch_update (switched off) takes raw Slides API requests: updateTextStyle, updateParagraphStyle, deleteText, createTable, replaceAllShapesWithImage, createSlide with a layoutId from the presentation's layouts. Pass write_control {"requiredRevisionId": "<revisionId>"} from the last read to fail instead of editing a deck someone changed in between. All requests in one call apply together or not at all.

Quotas: Google allows 600 read and 60 write requests per minute per user (3,000 and 600 per project); thumbnails count as expensive reads, 60 per minute per user. Over the limit it answers 429 RESOURCE_EXHAUSTED: wait a minute and retry. Several edits in one google_slides_batch_update count as one write.

Common errors

• 401: the authorization expired or was revoked (always after 7 days while the consent screen is in Testing). Click Authorize with Provider again.
• 403 PERMISSION_DENIED: the account cannot open (or cannot edit) that presentation, or the scope is read-only. 403 "Slides API has not been used in project": enable the Google Slides API in the Cloud project.
• 404: the presentation id is wrong, or the id belongs to another file type (a PowerPoint file uploaded to Drive is not a Slides presentation until converted).
• 400 The object (...) could not be found: the objectId is wrong or was deleted; read the presentation again. 400 on google_slides_add_slide: the theme has no such layout, pick another. 400 on images: the URL is not public or the file is not PNG, JPEG or GIF.

Out of scope here: comments, sharing, moving and deleting presentation files (Google Drive connector), exporting to PDF or PowerPoint (Google Drive connector's export), and editing PowerPoint files stored in Drive.