Glean Install & Auth

Overview

Configure Glean API authentication for enterprise search and knowledge management. Glean has two APIs: the Indexing API (push content into search) and the Client API (search and retrieve). Each uses separate tokens. Base URL: https://<domain>-be.glean.com/api.

Prerequisites

Glean enterprise account with admin access
API token from Glean Admin > API Tokens
Your Glean deployment domain (e.g., company-be.glean.com)

Instructions

Step 1: Obtain API Tokens

Navigate to Glean Admin Console > Settings > API:

Token Type	Purpose	Required Header
Indexing API token	Push documents into search index	`Authorization: Bearer <token>`
Client API token	Search, chat, user-scoped queries	`Authorization: Bearer <token>` + `X-Glean-Auth-Type: BEARER`

Step 2: Configure Environment Variables

# .env (NEVER commit)
GLEAN_DOMAIN=company-be.glean.com
GLEAN_INDEXING_TOKEN=glean_idx_...
GLEAN_CLIENT_TOKEN=glean_cli_...
GLEAN_DATASOURCE=custom_app  # Your custom datasource name

Step 3: Install SDK and Verify

npm install @anthropic-ai/glean-indexing-api-client  # Or use fetch directly

const GLEAN_BASE = `https://${process.env.GLEAN_DOMAIN}/api`;

// Verify indexing API access
async function verifyIndexingAccess() {
  const res = await fetch(`${GLEAN_BASE}/index/v1/getdatasourceconfig`, {
    method: 'POST',
    headers: {
      'Authorization': `Bearer ${process.env.GLEAN_INDEXING_TOKEN}`,
      'Content-Type': 'application/json',
    },
    body: JSON.stringify({ datasource: process.env.GLEAN_DATASOURCE }),
  });
  const config = await res.json();
  console.log(`Connected. Datasource: ${config.name}`);
}

// Verify client API access
async function verifySearchAccess() {
  const res = await fetch(`${GLEAN_BASE}/client/v1/search`, {
    method: 'POST',
    headers: {
      'Authorization': `Bearer ${process.env.GLEAN_CLIENT_TOKEN}`,
      'X-Glean-Auth-Type': 'BEARER',
      'Content-Type': 'application/json',
    },
    body: JSON.stringify({ query: 'test', pageSize: 1 }),
  });
  const results = await res.json();
  console.log(`Search works. Found ${results.results?.length ?? 0} results.`);
}

Error Handling

Error	Code	Cause	Solution
`Unauthorized`	401	Invalid token	Regenerate in Admin > API Tokens
`Forbidden`	403	Token lacks scope	Use correct token type (indexing vs client)
`Not Found`	404	Wrong domain	Verify GLEAN_DOMAIN includes `-be` suffix

Resources

Next Steps

After auth, proceed to glean-hello-world for your first index and search.