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::edgecontainer_v1::EdgeContainerClient(
google::cloud::edgecontainer_v1::MakeEdgeContainerConnection(options));
}
[[["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complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-14 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eThe latest version available is 2.37.0-rc, with numerous other versions, from 2.36.0 down to 2.11.0, also accessible.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eBy default, client libraries use Application Default Credentials for authentication, but you can override this by using the \u003ccode\u003eUnifiedCredentialsOption\u003c/code\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eYou can explicitly load a service account key file for authentication using the \u003ccode\u003eUnifiedCredentialsOption\u003c/code\u003e, as demonstrated in the provided example.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eRefer to the "Best practices for managing service account keys" guide for comprehensive information on handling service account keys.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe "Authentication Components" link provides further details on creating \u003ccode\u003egoogle::cloud::Credentials\u003c/code\u003e objects using factory functions.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,[]]