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::optimization_v1::FleetRoutingClient(
google::cloud::optimization_v1::MakeFleetRoutingConnection(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complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-14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\u003eThis page provides documentation for overriding default authentication credentials when using Google Cloud client libraries, specifically focusing on C++ optimization.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe latest release candidate version for optimization is 2.37.0-rc, with multiple prior versions available, ranging from 2.11.0 to 2.36.0.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe default authentication method uses Application Default Credentials, but can be overridden using \u003ccode\u003eUnifiedCredentialsOption\u003c/code\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe provided example demonstrates loading a service account key file to override the default authentication for \u003ccode\u003eFleetRoutingClient\u003c/code\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eFor further details on authentication, refer to the "Best practices for managing service account keys" guide and the "Authentication Components" documentation.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,[]]