I completed the browser auth flow. The script still said ‘Auth required.’ The shell wrapper and TypeScript implementation disagreed about what ‘authenticated’ meant.

What Happened

NotebookLM upload skill failed with “Auth required” even after user completed browser auth flow.

Investigation

Shell script (notebook.sh) checked for auth like this:

AUTH_FILE="$AUTH_DIR/notebook-lm-auth.json"
if [[ ! -f "$AUTH_FILE" ]]; then
    echo "Auth required..."
fi

But TypeScript upload script (upload.ts) actually used Chrome profile:

const AUTH_DIR = join(homedir(), ".config", "moltbot", "notebook-lm-chrome");
// ... launches browser with userDataDir

The auth flow saved a Chrome profile directory, not a JSON file. The shell script checked for the wrong artifact.

Resolution

Fixed shell script to check for Chrome profile instead:

CHROME_PROFILE="$AUTH_DIR/notebook-lm-chrome/Default"
if [[ ! -d "$CHROME_PROFILE" ]]; then
    echo "Auth required..."
fi

Lesson

When integrating scripts in different languages, verify the actual artifacts each component creates.

Common pattern: Shell wrapper → TypeScript implementation. The wrapper often makes assumptions about what the implementation does. Always trace the actual file/directory creation path.

Debugging Tip

# Before: "Why doesn't auth work?"
ls -la ~/.config/moltbot/notebook-lm*
# Reveals: notebook-lm-chrome/ exists, notebook-lm-auth.json does not