You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.
Forum Discussion
af11
3 years agoExplorer | Level 4
dropbox.exceptions.AuthError: expired access token
When I run an app I developed, I get an error.
dropbox.exceptions.AuthError: AuthError('89ade68e26bd49d592d01bfbfae5659b', AuthError('expired_access_token', None))
What could be wrong with my OAu...
- 3 years ago
That's correct, Dropbox is in the process of switching to only issuing short-lived access tokens (and optional refresh tokens) instead of long-lived access tokens. You can find more information on this migration here.
Apps can still get long-term access by requesting "offline" access though, in which case the app receives a "refresh token" that can be used to retrieve new short-lived access tokens as needed, without further manual user intervention. You can find more information in the OAuth Guide and authorization documentation.
For reference, while the creation of new long-lived access tokens is now deprecated, we don't currently have a plan to disable existing long-lived access tokens. (If that changes, we will of course announce that ahead of time.) That being the case, you can continue using existing long-lived access token(s) without interruption, if you have any. Also, note though that after the change you won't be able to create new long-lived access tokens.
While the change began on September 30th 2021, we're releasing it gradually, so you may not have seen your app(s) affected until now. Once it applies to your app, it would apply regardless of the "Access token expiration" setting for your app, and that setting may no longer be available for your app.You can find an example of getting and setting the refresh token with the Dropbox API v2 Python SDK here.
marksmithhfx
Explorer | Level 4
I see in the documentation it says this "If the <token_access_type> is omitted, the response will default to returning a long-lived access_token if they are allowed in the app console. If long-lived access tokens are disabled in the app console, this parameter defaults to online". When I looked in the app console I could find a reference to long lived access tokens but, in another part of the documentation it shows a screen that has an "access token expiration (with options for short and long lived)" underneath the option to Generate Access Token. I do not see that on my screen however (ie. nothing underneath Generate Access Token to indicate the expiration period). I too need to dish out long lived access tokens to my users. Thanks for any clarification you can provide. PS both pieces of information were taken from documentation on the DropBox website today (under documentation). Thanks
tahsini
3 years agoDropbox Staff
Dropbox is in the process of switching to only issuing short-lived access tokens (and optional refresh tokens) instead of long-lived access tokens. While the change began on September 30th 2021, we're releasing it gradually, so some users may not have seen app(s) affected until now and the option is available in their app console.
Apps can still get long-term access by requesting "offline" access though, in which case the app receives a "refresh token" that can be used to retrieve new short-lived access tokens as needed, without further manual user intervention. You can find more information in the OAuth Guide and authorization documentation.
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