navorder: 1
---
-# API authentication
+# Getting an API token
+
+> Needs a line or two to the effect of "an API token is a secret key that
+> enables the command line client to access arvados with the proper
+> permissions".
Open a browser and point it to the Workbench URL for your site. It
will look something like this:
-`https://workbench.a123z.arvados.org/`
+`https://workbench.{{ site.arvados_api_host }}/`
Log in, if you haven't done that already.
Click the "API tokens" link.
-Copy an API token and set an environment variable in your terminal
-session like this.
+> Need to indicate that "API Tokens" is underneath "Access"
+
+At the top of the "API tokens" page, you will see a few lines like this.
+
+ ### Pasting the following lines at a shell prompt will allow Arvados SDKs
+ ### to authenticate to your account, youraddress@example.com
+
+ read ARVADOS_API_TOKEN <<EOF
+ 2jv9kd1o39t0pcfu7aueem7a1zjxhak73w90tzq3gx0es7j1ld
+ EOF
+ export ARVADOS_API_TOKEN ARVADOS_API_HOST=qr1hi.arvadosapi.com
+
+Paste those lines into your terminal window to set up your
+terminal. This effectively copies your credentials from your browser
+to your terminal session.
+
+Now, `arv -h user current` will display your account info in JSON
+format.
+
+> What does `-h` mean?
+
+Optionally, copy those lines to your .bashrc file so you don't have to
+repeat this process each time you log in.
+
+### SSL + development mode
+
+> This section should go somewhere else, it is confusing to a new user.
+
+If you are using a local development server with a self-signed
+certificate, you might need to bypass certificate verification. Don't
+do this if you are using a production service.
+
+ export ARVADOS_API_HOST_INSECURE=yes
- export ARVADOS_API_TOKEN=unvz7ktg5p5k2q4wb9hpfl9fkge96rvv1j1gjpiq
projects / arvados.git / blobdiff