Disable, enable, and delete a label

This document describes how to perform these tasks involving labels:

• Disable a label
• Enable a label
• Delete a label

Disable a label

Disabling a label results in a new disabled published revision based on the current published revision. If there's a draft revision, a new disabled draft revision is created based on the latest draft revision. Older draft revisions are deleted. For more information, see Label lifecycle.

Once disabled, users can still apply this label through the Google Drive Labels API. The label still appears where it's already been applied and in your search results. A disabled label can be deleted.

To disable a published label, use the disable method on the labels resource.

You also must specify:

• A labels resource that represents the label. It contains a name and an id, which is a globally unique identifier for the label.

• The useAdminAccess query parameter is set to true to use the user's administrator credentials. Before allowing access, the server verifies that the user has the required Manage Classification Labels administrator privileges.

The following code sample shows how to use the label's id to disable the correct label:

service.labels().disable(
    name='labels/ID',
    body={
        'useAdminAccess': True
    }
).execute()

service.labels.disable({
  name: 'labels/ID',
  requestBody: {
    useAdminAccess: true
  }
}, (err, res) => {
  if (err) return console.error('The API returned an error: ' + err);
  console.log(res);
});

Replace ID with the ID of the label to disable.

The label has the State of DISABLED and the label's revision ID is incremented. Users can apply the label through the Drive Labels API. However, a disabled label isn't shown in a UI unless the showInApply field of the DisabledPolicy object is configured.

Enable a label

Enabling a disabled label restores it to its published state. It results in a new published revision based on the current disabled published revision. If there's an existing disabled draft revision, a new revision is created based on that draft and is enabled. For more information, see Label lifecycle.

To enable a disabled label, use the enable method on the labels resource.

You also must specify:

• A labels resource that represents the label. It contains a name and an id, which is a globally unique identifier for the label.

• The useAdminAccess query parameter is set to true to use the user's administrator credentials. Before allowing access, the server verifies that the user has the required Manage Classification Labels administrator privileges.

The following code sample shows how to use the label's id to enable the correct label:

service.labels().enable(
    name='labels/ID',
    body={
        'useAdminAccess': True
    }
).execute()

service.labels.enable({
  name: 'labels/ID',
  requestBody: {
    useAdminAccess: true
  }
}, (err, res) => {
  if (err) return console.error('The API returned an error: ' + err);
  console.log(res);
});

Replace ID with the ID of the label to enable.

The label has the State of PUBLISHED and the label's revision ID is incremented. Users can view and apply the label to files through the Drive Labels API.

Delete a label

Only draft and disabled labels can be deleted. When a label is deleted, all instances where the label was previously applied, including any corresponding field values entered by users, are permanently deleted and removed from those Drive files.

To delete a label, you must first disable it and then use the delete method on the labels resource.

You also must specify:

• A labels resource that represents the label. It contains a name and an id, which is a globally unique identifier for the label.

• The useAdminAccess query parameter is set to true to use the user's administrator credentials. Before allowing access, the server verifies that the user has the required Manage Classification Labels administrator privileges.

The following code sample shows how to use the label's id to delete the correct label:

response = service.labels().delete(
    name='labels/ID',
    useAdminAccess=True
).execute()

service.labels.delete({
  name: 'labels/ID',
  useAdminAccess: true
}, (err, res) => {
  if (err) return console.error('The API returned an error: ' + err);
  console.log(res);
});

Replace ID with the ID of the label to delete.

The label has the State of DELETED and the label's revision ID is incremented. The label cannot be applied and deleted labels are eventually purged. For more information, see Label lifecycle.