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::edgenetwork_v1::EdgeNetworkClient(
google::cloud::edgenetwork_v1::MakeEdgeNetworkConnection(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complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-14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 multiple other versions from 2.36.0 to 2.19.0 also accessible.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eBy default, client libraries utilize Application Default Credentials for Google Cloud Services authentication.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eAuthentication credentials can be overridden using the UnifiedCredentialsOption, such as loading a service account key file.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe provided code example demonstrates how to load a service account key file for authentication, but consult best practices for service account key management.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eFor further details on creating \u003ccode\u003egoogle::cloud::Credentials\u003c/code\u003e objects, refer to the Authentication Components section.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,[]]