Chainguard Libraries access

Chainguard Libraries provide controlled access to security-enhanced Java and Python dependencies through the unified Chainguard platform authentication system. This guide explains how to set up access for your organization.

Getting started

Prerequisites

• Ensure you have access to Chainguard Libraries.
  • If you are not a Chainguard user yet, a new Chainguard account must be created and configured for access to Chainguard Libraries.
  • If you are already a Chainguard user, the Chainguard account owner in your organization can grant access to Chainguard Libraries.
• Confirm the name of your organization so you can use it with the --parent parameter to specify your organization when running commands with chainctl.

Direct access vs. artifact manager

There are two approaches to access: Using an artifact manager or direct access.

Artifact manager

If your organization uses an artifact manager such as JFrog Artifactory or Sonatype Nexus, you can set up and configure credentials once per language ecosystem. Then, all projects and developers automatically inherit the configuration. This option is recommended for organizations with multiple teams, and provides centralized access controls and consistent uptime.

Direct access

Set up authentication directly in each project’s build configuration. This option allows for faster initial setup, but it does not allow for global configuration. It requires configuration per project and workstation, which creates more overhead as you scale across teams and projects.

Both approaches require pull tokens for authentication; see Pull token characteristics and use for more information.

NOTE: For Python users, the Chainguard keyring provider uses short-lived credentials and is the preferred method where your environment supports it.

Initial authentication

Once your user account is created and access is confirmed, install the Chainguard Control chainctl command line tool and log in to your account:

chainctl auth login

After authentication in a browser window, a successful login displays a message and a token:

Successfully exchanged token.
Valid! Id: 8a4141a........7d9904d98c

Creating pull tokens for libraries

Pull tokens are separate identities with an assigned role to access the repositories from Chainguard Libraries. You can create the pull tokens:

• With the chainctl command, or
• Using the Chainguard console.

For environments where short-lived credentials are not suitable, such as some CI/CD platforms, you can generate a pull token, which provides longer-lived access to Chainguard Libraries.

To create a pull token you must have the relevant entitlement for the ecosystem and the libraries.java.pull_token_creator, libraries.javascript.pull_token_creator, or libraries.python.pull_token_creator role.

Creating pull tokens with chainctl

Create a new pull token for the Chainguard Libraries for Java with the chainctl auth pull-token command:

chainctl auth pull-token --repository=java --parent=example --ttl=8670h

• --repository=java: retrieve the token for use with Chainguard Libraries for Java. Use python for a token to use Chainguard Libraries for Python and javascript for a token to use Chainguard Libraries for JavaScript.
• --parent=example: specify the parent organization for your account as provided when requesting access to Chainguard Libraries and replace example.
• --ttl=8670h: set the duration for the validity of the token, defaults to 720h (equivalent to 30 days), maximum valid value is 8760h (equivalent to 365 days), valid unit strings range from nanoseconds to hours and are ns, us, ms, s, m, and h.

Use the optional --name flag to supply a meaningful and short name for the token, to be able to locate it easier at a later stage.

When omitting the parent parameter, potentially a list of organizations is displayed. Use the arrow keys to navigate the selection displayed after the question “With which location is the pull token associated?” and select the organization that has the entitlement to access Chainguard Libraries for Java. Press / to filter the list.

chainctl returns a username and password suitable for basic authentication in the response:

Username: 45a.....424eb0

Password: eyJhbGciO..........WF0IjoxN

Creating pull tokens with the Chainguard console

Follow these steps to create a pull token for Chainguard Libraries in the Chainguard console:

1. Use your authentication details to access the console at https://console.chainguard.dev/.
2. In the left-hand navigation, click Overview.
3. Click the Manage pull tokens tab, then click Create access token.
   • Alternatively, select Access Tokens from the menu at the top of the Settings page.
4. Configure the access token:
   • Name: Provide a name. The name can later be used to locate the token in the list.
   • Description: Optionally provide a description of the token.
   • Access: Choose the library that this token should access.
   • Expiration: Set an expiration date for the token. The default is 30 days.
5. Click Create token.
6. When the username and password values are displayed, note these values in a secure location, as you will need them for pull token use. These values will not be displayed again.

Pull token characteristics and use

The returned username and password combination is a new credential set in the organization that is independent of the account used to create and retrieve the credential set. It is therefore suitable for use in any service application, such as a repository manager or a build tool that is not tied to a specific user. You can also use the token as an individual for your development with direct access to Chainguard Libraries.

To use the pull token in another environment, supply the username and password for basic authentication. Note that the actual returned values are much longer.

Note: Chainguard does not offer an SLA for uptime availability of the Chainguard Libraries repositories at libraries.cgr.dev. To reduce production risk and ensure reliability, we recommend proxying the repositories through your own artifact repository whenever possible.

For artifact manager setup, see the global configuration guides:

• Java
• JavaScript
• Python

For direct access, see the build configuration guides:

• Java
• JavaScript
• Python

Use environment variables for pull token credentials

Using environment variables for username and password is more secure than hard coding the values in configuration files. In addition, you can use the same configuration and files for all users to simplify setup and reduce errors.

Use the env environment output option to create a snippet for a new token suitable for integration in a script.

$ chainctl auth pull-token --output env --repository=java --parent=example
export CHAINGUARD_JAVA_IDENTITY_ID=45a.....424eb0
export CHAINGUARD_JAVA_TOKEN=eeyJhbGciO..........WF0IjoxN

Combine the call with eval to populate the environment variables directly by calling chainctl:

eval $(chainctl auth pull-token --output env --repository=java --parent=example)

Equivalent commands for Python and JavaScript are supported and result in values for the CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_IDENTITY_ID/CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_TOKEN and CHAINGUARD_JAVASCRIPT_IDENTITY_ID/CHAINGUARD_JAVASCRIPT_TOKEN variables.

Running this command as part of a login script or some other automation allows your organization to replace actual username and password values in your build tool configuration with environment variable placeholders:

• Java build tool configuration
• JavaScript build tool configuration
• Python build tool configuration

.netrc for authentication

curl and a number of other tools support configuration of username and password authentication details for a specific domain in the .netrc file, typically located in the user’s home directory.

Use this approach for authentication to a repository manager in your organization or to Chainguard Libraries directly, for example with pip and others for Chainguard Libraries for Python, with bazel for Chainguard Libraries for Java or for manual testing with curl.

The following example shows a suitable setup for a repo manager available at repo.example.com:

machine repo.example.com
login YOUR_USERNAME_FOR_REPOSITORY_MANAGER
password YOUR_PASSWORD

For a direct connection to Chainguard Libraries, for example for testing with curl, use the following example with the username CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_IDENTITY_ID and password CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_TOKEN value for the pull token for the desired language ecosystem:

machine libraries.cgr.dev
login CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_IDENTITY_ID
password CHAINGUARD_PYTHON_TOKEN

Note that the long string for the password value must use only one line.

Verification

Use the credentials for manual testing in a browser or with a script and curl if you know the URL for a specific library artifact. Refer to the following sections for more details:

• Technical details and manual testing for Java libraries
• Technical details and manual testing for JavaScript libraries
• Technical details and manual testing for Python libraries
• Use environment variables
• .netrc for authentication

Python keyring provider

Python users can leverage an alternative to pull tokens. The Chainguard keyring implementation provides short-lived credentials from supported environments, such as local development and CI/CD platforms that can use assumable identities.

Where possible, Chainguard recommends using short-lived credentials to access Chainguard Libraries.

To set up the keyring, install the keyrings-chainguard-libraries package:

pip install keyrings-chainguard-libraries

Note: If you haven’t set up access to Chainguard Libraries for Python, the above command installs the package from PyPI. After installing and configuring Chainguard Libraries for Python, you can get the private package again, to get the package built by Chainguard. To re-install the package:

pip install keyrings-chainguard-libraries --ignore-installed --no-cache-dir

Once the keyring package is installed, when you request to install packages from Chainguard Libraries for Python, the keyring automatically retrieves short-lived credentials for you, using chainctl.

To use the keyring with a project uv, install the keyring:

uv pip install keyrings-chainguard-libraries

Note: If you haven’t set up access to Chainguard Libraries for Python, the above command installs the package from PyPI. After installing and configuring Chainguard Libraries for Python, you can get the private package again, to get the package built by Chainguard. To re-install the package:

uv pip install keyrings-chainguard-libraries --reinstall --no-cache

By default, uv disables keyring auth.

To enable it in the global uv.toml:

keyring-provider = "subprocess"

To enable it in a project-specific pyproject.toml:

[tool.uv]
keyring-provider = "subprocess"

Pull token management

Pull tokens are separate identities with username and password that are used for access to Chainguard Libraries. The tokens have a limited Time to Live (TTL) with a default of 30 days and a maximum TTL of 365 days.

As a result, pull tokens become invalid after the TTL and are flagged as expired. For your use of Chainguard Libraries you must replace the token with a new one.

Expired tokens can no longer be used for access to Chainguard Libraries, but otherwise do not cause any issues and continue to exist until you delete them.

Inspect all pull tokens for your organization in the Chainguard console:

• Use your authentication details to access the console at https://console.chainguard.dev/.
• Select Overview in the left-hand navigation.
• Select the Manage pull tokens tab.
  • Alternatively, select Settings in the left-hand navigation, and select Pull Tokens in the menu on the settings page.

The list includes the following columns:

• Name - the name of the pull token, expired pull token are identified by a red Expired warning.
• Description - the description of the pull token
• Created - the date when the pull token was created
• Expiration - string description of the expiration status of the token, such as in 8 months or 4 days ago.
• Actions - menu button to perform actions on the pull token, only a Delete action is available.

Use the action to remove a pull token:

• Locate the row of the desired pull token, typically an expired token.
• Use the menu button in the Actions column of the same row and select Delete.
• Confirm the deletion in the dialog by pressing Delete pull token.

Alternatively use chainctl with the auth pull-token and iam identities commands for various inspection and management tasks.

List all pull tokens with the list command:

chainctl auth pull-token list

The displayed list includes the following columns:

• ID - the identifying username of the pull token
• NAME - the name of the pull token
• DESCRIPTION - the description of the pull token
• ROLES - the assigned organization and role for the pull token. The value shows the name of the organization separate from the role with a colon. Valid roles are all pull authorization from for apk packages apk.pull, container images registry.pull, Python libraries libraries.python.pull, Java libraries libraries.java.pull, and JavaScript libraries libraries.javascript.pull .
• EXPIRES - the number of days until the end of the TTL period. Negative values indicate expired tokens.

List all pull tokens for Chainguard Libraries for Java that are not yet expired:

chainctl auth pull-token list --repository=java

List all expired pull tokens for Chainguard Libraries for Python:

chainctl auth pull-token list --repository=java --expired=true

Use the delete command for IAM identities to delete a specific pull token using its ID 45a0c61ea6fd97...:

chainctl iam identities delete 45a0c61ea6fd97...

Use the identifier or name of your organization example and the --expired flag to remove all expired pull tokens:

chainctl iam ids rm --expired --parent=example

Verify entitlement

You can verify entitlements for your organization example with the following command:

chainctl libraries entitlements list --parent=example

The output must include the desired ecosystem in the table:

Ecosystem Library Entitlements for example (45a0...764595)

                             ID                             | ECOSYSTEM
------------------------------------------------------------+------------
  45a...................................................2cf | JAVASCRIPT
  45a....................................................e1 | JAVA
  45a....................................................x6 | PYTHON

Contact your Chainguard account owner for confirmation or adjustments if necessary.