Gmail fetch

Purpose

Fetch emails from Gmail so that other skills (particularly the email drafter twin) can work with inbox data. This skill is read-only; it never modifies, sends, or deletes emails.

Prerequisites

This skill uses the Gmail API via existing OAuth credentials at ~/code/airmail/. The following files must exist:

• ~/code/airmail/client_secret.json — Google OAuth client credentials
• ~/code/airmail/gmail_token.json — OAuth token (auto-refreshes)

Instructions

1. Authenticate with Gmail

Load the OAuth credentials and build a Gmail API client:

from google.oauth2.credentials import Credentials
from google.auth.transport.requests import Request
from googleapiclient.discovery import build

TOKEN_FILE = os.path.expanduser("~/code/airmail/gmail_token.json")
CLIENT_SECRET = os.path.expanduser("~/code/airmail/client_secret.json")

creds = Credentials.from_authorized_user_file(TOKEN_FILE)
if creds.expired and creds.refresh_token:
    creds.refresh(Request())
    with open(TOKEN_FILE, "w") as f:
        f.write(creds.to_json())

service = build("gmail", "v1", credentials=creds)

If the token file is missing, stop and report:

"Gmail token not found at ~/code/airmail/gmail_token.json. Run the OAuth flow in the airmail project first."

If authentication fails after refresh, stop and report:

"Gmail authentication failed. The token may be expired or revoked. Re-authenticate in ~/code/airmail/."

2. Parse the input parameters

Accept the following optional parameters. Apply defaults where not provided:

3. Fetch emails

1. List messages:

   pythonCopy

   results = service.users().messages().list(
       userId="me", q=query, maxResults=max_results
   ).execute()
   messages = results.get("messages", [])
   

2. For each message ID returned, fetch full details:

   pythonCopy

   msg = service.users().messages().get(
       userId="me", id=msg_id, format="full"
   ).execute()
   

3. If include_threads is true, fetch the thread:

   pythonCopy

   thread = service.users().threads().get(
       userId="me", id=thread_id, format="full"
   ).execute()
   

4. Normalise the results

For each email, extract and normalise:

• id: Gmail message ID
• thread_id: Gmail thread ID
• from: Sender name and email (from the From header)
• to: Recipient addresses (from the To header)
• cc: CC addresses (from the Cc header, if present)
• subject: Subject line (from the Subject header)
• body: Email body as plain text. If the email has a text/plain part, use it. If it only has text/html, strip the HTML tags to produce plain text. Truncate to 10,000 characters if longer, appending "[truncated]".
• date: Date sent (from the Date header), formatted as ISO 8601
• labels: Gmail labels (e.g. INBOX, UNREAD, IMPORTANT)
• snippet: Short preview of the body (first 200 characters)

If include_threads is true, for each thread include up to 10 of the most recent prior messages (excluding the current message) with:

• id: Message ID
• from: Sender
• date: Date sent (ISO 8601)
• body: Plain text body (truncated to 5,000 characters if longer)

5. Return the output

Present the results as a structured list of emails ordered by date (most recent first), along with:

• result_count: Number of emails returned
• query_used: The Gmail query that was executed

Error handling

• Token file missing: Stop and report: "Gmail token not found at ~/code/airmail/gmail_token.json"
• Authentication failure (401 or 403): Stop and report: "Gmail authentication failed. Re-authenticate in ~/code/airmail/."
• Rate limit exceeded (429): Stop and report: "Gmail API rate limit exceeded. Wait a few minutes before retrying."
• No results: Not an error. Return an empty list with result_count of 0.

Output format

result_count: 3
query_used: "is:unread"
emails:
  - id: "msg_abc123"
    thread_id: "thread_xyz789"
    from: "Alice Smith <alice@example.com>"
    to: ["user@example.com"]
    cc: []
    subject: "Re: Partnership proposal"
    body: "Hi, thanks for sending over the details..."
    date: "2026-02-25T09:30:00Z"
    labels: ["INBOX", "UNREAD"]
    snippet: "Hi, thanks for sending over the details..."
    thread_messages:
      - id: "msg_prev456"
        from: "user@example.com"
        date: "2026-02-24T16:00:00Z"
        body: "Hi Alice, please find attached..."