Summary

The Google Chat channel currently only supports Service Account authentication (scope chat.bot). This limits functionality:

• ❌ Reactions — spaces.messages.reactions.create requires user-level OAuth scopes
• ❌ Media uploads — attachments:upload fails with service account auth
• ❌ Proactive DMs — cannot initiate DMs using email aliases (403: "Service account authentication doesn't support access to user information using email aliases")
• ✅ Text messages and links work fine
• ✅ Receiving messages via webhook works fine

Proposal

Add optional user OAuth flow alongside the existing Service Account auth for Google Chat.

Suggested approach

1. Add a userOAuth config section under channels.googlechat for user-level credentials (client ID, client secret, refresh token)
2. Use the user OAuth token for operations that require user-level scopes (reactions, attachments, proactive DMs)
3. Keep Service Account for webhook verification and bot-level operations (receiving messages, sending replies in existing spaces)
4. Fall back gracefully: if no user OAuth is configured, skip unsupported operations with a warning

Required scopes

• https://www.googleapis.com/auth/chat.messages.reactions.create
• https://www.googleapis.com/auth/chat.messages.reactions.readonly
• https://www.googleapis.com/auth/chat.messages (for attachments and proactive DMs)

Config sketch

{
  channels: {
    googlechat: {
      // existing service account config (keep as-is)
      serviceAccountFile: "/path/to/sa.json",
      
      // new: user OAuth for enhanced operations
      userOAuth: {
        clientId: "...",
        clientSecret: "...",
        refreshToken: "...",
      }
    }
  }
}

Context

• The code already has createGoogleChatReaction() and uploadGoogleChatAttachment() in extensions/googlechat/src/api.ts — they work structurally but fail at runtime due to insufficient scope
• typingIndicator: "reaction" also requires user OAuth (noted in monitor.ts line 697)
• Proactive DMs via findDirectMessage require user auth to resolve email aliases

Environment

• OpenClaw 2026.2.1
• Google Chat app configured via webhook + Service Account
• Tested with GCP project using Chat API v1