THIS GEM IS SEEKING NEW MAINTAINERS!

In case you haven't already heard, Google is killing Google Checkout.

I don't plan on maintaining this gem any longer. I'd actually already transitioned my app away from Google Checkout (and to a donation-supported business model). However, @knimbler points out that some people may still be interested in a gem to support Google's Wallet for Digital Goods API.

If you are interested in such a gem, and think that google4r-checkout might make a good basis for it, and you are interested in maintaining the gem as a result, please contact me. If I don't find a new maintainer by the time Google Checkout goes offline, I will simply retire this gem.

<3, Nat

google4r/checkout

google4r/checkout is a library to access the Google Checkout API.

It currently supports version 2.3 of the API and subscription beta API.

License

google4r itself is distributed under an MIT style license.

However, the library includes the cacert.pem file from the Mozilla project. This file is distributed under the MPL.

Installing

Gems are hosted on rubygems.org (aka Gemcutter), so on reasonably recent versions of Rubygems, you should be able to install just like this:

gem install google4r-checkout

Or, go to our page on rubygems.org.

Issue Tracking and Wiki

Our issue tracker and wiki can be found on Google Code. The best way to let us know about bugs or feature requests is to report an issue there.

Documentation

We've got RDoc documentation for the google4r-checkout library generated on rdoc.info.

You can find more information on the Google Checkout API here. Note that the API documentation assumes an understanding of the Google Checkout XML API.

Google Checkout Tests

You have to place a file called 'frontend_configuration.rb' in the directory'test' with the configuration for the Google4R::Checkout::Frontend class to use for running the tests.

The file should contain content similar to:

# Uncomment the following line if you are using Google Checkout in Great Britain
# and adjust it if you want to test google4r-checkout against any other (future)
# Google Checkout service.
    
# Money.default_currency = 'GBP'

# The test configuration for the Google4R::Checkout::Frontend class.
FRONTEND_CONFIGURATION = 
  { 
    :merchant_id => '<your merchant id>', 
    :merchant_key => '<your merchant key>',
    :use_sandbox => true
  }

Sending Commands to Google Checkout

To send commands to Google Checkout, use a Google4R::Checkout::Frontend object. The Frontend class contains a variety of methods for easily generating several types of commands, including checkout, cancel_order, charge_and_ship_order, etc.

Here's an example:

# Create the Frontend from our configuration
frontend = Google4R::Checkout::Frontend.new(
  :merchant_id => conf['merchant_id'],
  :merchant_key => conf['merchant_key'],
  :use_sandbox => conf['use_sandbox']
)
      
# Create a new checkout command (to place an order)
cmd = frontend.create_checkout_command
      
# Add an item to the command's shopping cart
cmd.shopping_cart.create_item do |item|
  item.name = "2-liter bottle of Diet Pepsi"
  item.quantity = 100
  item.unit_price = Money.new(1.99, "USD")
end
      
# Send the command to Google and capture the HTTP response
begin
  response = cmd.send_to_google_checkout
rescue Net::HTTPServerError => e
  # Sometimes Google Checkout is unavailable for internal reasons.
  # Because of this, it's a good idea to catch Net::HTTPServerError
  # and retry.
  
  response = cmd.send_to_google_checkout
end
      
# Redirect the user to Google Checkout to complete the transaction
redirect_to response.redirect_url

For more information, see the Frontend class's RDocs and the Google Checkout API documentation.

Writing Responders

To receive notifications from Google Checkout, you'll need to write an action in your web application to respond to Google Checkout XML requests. The basic strategy for this is to use a NotificationHandler object (which can be obtained through a Frontend object) to parse the HTTP request, then handle the resulting Notification object according to its class. You should then generate a NotificationAcknowledgment and return it as the response.

It's a good idea to verify the HTTP authentication headers for incoming requests. This will be a combination of your Merchant ID and Merchant Key.

Here is an example of how one might do this in Rails:

class PaymentNotificationController < ApplicationController
  before_filter :verify_merchant_credentials, :only => [:google]
  
  def google
    frontend = Google4R::Checkout::Frontend.new(
      :merchant_id => conf['merchant_id'],
      :merchant_key => conf['merchant_key'],
      :use_sandbox => conf['use_sandbox']
    )
    handler = frontend.create_notification_handler
    
    begin
       notification = handler.handle(request.raw_post) # raw_post contains the XML
    rescue Google4R::Checkout::UnknownNotificationType
       # This can happen if Google adds new commands and Google4R has not been
       # upgraded yet. It is not fatal.
       logger.warn "Unknown notification type"
       return render :text => 'ignoring unknown notification type', :status => 200
    end
    
    case notification
    when Google4R::Checkout::NewOrderNotification then
      
      # handle a NewOrderNotification
      
    when Google4R::Checkout::OrderStateChangeNotification then
      
      # handle an OrderStateChangeNotification
      
    else
      return head :text => "I don't know how to handle a #{notification.class}", :status => 500
    end

    notification_acknowledgement = Google4R::Checkout::NotificationAcknowledgement.new(notification)
    render :xml => notification_acknowledgement.to_xml, :status => 200
  end

  private
  # make sure the request authentication headers use the right merchant_id and merchant_key
  def verify_merchant_credentials
    authenticate_or_request_with_http_basic("Google Checkout notification endpoint") do |merchant_id, merchant_key|
      (conf['merchant_id'].to_s == merchant_id.to_s) and (conf['merchant_key'].to_s == merchant_key.to_s)
    end
  end
end

Dependencies

google4r-checkout makes extensive use of the money gem library, which is a required dependency. The unit tests also use Mocha and Nokogiri, which should be automatically pulled down by Bundler.

google4r-checkout doesn't depend on any particular Ruby web framework, so it should work with any version of Rails, Sinatra, Camping, or even no web framework at all.