gcloud CLI Examples

Audience: Cloud Engineers and Developers.

Purpose: Reference commands for common GCP operations using the gcloud CLI.

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Overview

The gcloud CLI is the primary command-line interface for Google Cloud Platform. This guide provides examples for common administrative tasks.

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Documentation Links

Resource	Description
gcloud CLI Overview	Official documentation
gcloud Reference	Complete command reference
Scripting Guide	Automation best practices

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Project Queries

List Projects by Billing Account

Return information about all projects linked to the TAMUNI-i2-Primary-Burwood billing account:

# Billing Account ID: 0152CF-9A23B4-75E0E7

gcloud beta billing projects list \
  --billing-account="0152CF-9A23B4-75E0E7" \
  --format="value(projectId)" | \
while read -r line; do 
  gcloud projects describe $line --format=json(projectId,projectNumber,labels)
done

Query Project Tags

Return all tags associated with projects linked to the billing account:

gcloud beta billing projects list \
  --billing-account="0152CF-9A23B4-75E0E7" \
  --format="value(projectId)" | \
while read -r line; do 
  gcloud asset search-all-resources \
    --scope=projects/$line \
    --asset-types=cloudresourcemanager.googleapis.com/TagKey \
    --format=json
done

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Output Formatting

Common format options for gcloud commands:

Format	Description	Example
json	Full JSON output	--format=json
yaml	YAML output	--format=yaml
table	Tabular output	--format=table
value	Plain values (for scripting)	--format="value(field)"
csv	CSV output	--format=csv

Selective Field Output

# Return only specific fields
gcloud projects describe PROJECT_ID \
  --format="json(projectId,projectNumber,labels)"

# Get just the project ID
gcloud projects list --format="value(projectId)"

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Tips for Scripting

Avoid Interactive Prompts

Use --quiet or -q to suppress interactive prompts in scripts:

gcloud projects delete PROJECT_ID --quiet

Output Parsing

Use jq to parse JSON output:

gcloud projects list --format=json | jq '.[].projectId'