Unless otherwise configured, the client libraries use Application Default Credentials to authenticate with Google Cloud Services. While this works for most applications, in some cases you may need to override this default. You can do so by providing the UnifiedCredentialsOption The following example shows how to explicitly load a service account key file:
[](std::string const& keyfile) {
auto is = std::ifstream(keyfile);
is.exceptions(std::ios::badbit); // Minimal error handling in examples
auto contents = std::string(std::istreambuf_iterator<char>(is.rdbuf()), {});
auto options =
google::cloud::Options{}.set<google::cloud::UnifiedCredentialsOption>(
google::cloud::MakeServiceAccountCredentials(contents));
return google::cloud::dataproc_v1::AutoscalingPolicyServiceClient(
google::cloud::dataproc_v1::MakeAutoscalingPolicyServiceConnection(
options));
}
Follow these links to find examples for other *Client classes:
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Missing the information I need","missingTheInformationINeed","thumb-down"],["Too complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-07-09 UTC."],[[["This page provides documentation for overriding default authentication credentials when using Google Cloud client libraries, specifically focusing on the `UnifiedCredentialsOption`."],["The latest release is version 2.37.0-rc, with documentation provided for versions dating back to 2.11.0."],["The example provided demonstrates loading credentials from a service account key file using `MakeServiceAccountCredentials` and setting the `UnifiedCredentialsOption`."],["The documentation also includes examples for several `*Client` classes, such as `AutoscalingPolicyServiceClient`, `BatchControllerClient`, and `WorkflowTemplateServiceClient`, with links to specific code snippets."],["For best practices on service account key management and further information on authentication, links are provided to the relevant Google Cloud documentation and `Authentication Components`."]]],[]]