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CLI

Command Line Interface (CLI)

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There are a handful of ways to interact with the Akeyless Platform for managing, creating, and fetching multiple types of supported secrets. One of them is our Command Line Interface (CLI).

The Akeyless CLI has a pre-compiled binary version for Linux, macOS, and Windows which can be easily installed.

Download

To pull the latest CLI version from the Akeyless official bucket, please make sure that: https://akeyless-cli.s3.* endpoint is trusted.

Run the following command to download and install the CLI binary:

curl -o akeyless https://akeyless-cli.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/cli/latest/production/cli-linux-amd64
chmod +x akeyless
./akeyless

curl -o akeyless https://akeyless-cli.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/cli/latest/production/cli-linux-arm64
chmod +x akeyless
./akeyless

curl -o akeyless https://akeyless-cli.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/cli/latest/production/cli-darwin-amd64
chmod +x akeyless
./akeyless

curl -o akeyless https://akeyless-cli.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/cli/latest/cli-darwin-arm64
chmod +x akeyless
./akeyless

curl -o akeyless.exe https://akeyless-cli.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/cli/latest/production/cli-windows-amd64.exe
akeyless.exe

Or using Homebrew package manager for MacOS:

brew install akeylesslabs/tap/akeyless

Authentication

The CLI supports various types of Authentication Methods:

  1. API Key (access_key)
  2. AWS IAM (aws_iam)
  3. Azure Active Directory (azure_ad)
  4. SAML (saml)
  5. Password (email/password)
  6. Certificate (certificate)
  7. OIDC (oidc)
  8. K8s (k8s)
  9. GCP (GCP)
  10. OCI (oci)

For security reasons, if the correct credentials are not entered, the Akeyless CLI will not provide an error message immediately. Instead, you will receive an error message when attempting to run commands.

Installation

Running the CLI for the first time will start an interactive flow by default, where you can modify the basic settings if needed.

For example, the default Akeyless URL should be vault.akeyless.io unless specifically you are running in a different SaaS environment, press Enter to leave the URL as is: 

"AKEYLESS-CLI, first use detected
Enter Akeyless URL (Default: vault.akeyless.io)"

At the prompt Would you like to configure a profile (Y/n) line, type Y. Then, type a name to rename the default profile, or press Enter to leave the name as default:

"Would you like to configure a profile? (Y/n) Y
Profile Name:  (Default: default)"

Choose an Authentication Method from the list to configure the profile with, where pressing Enter will use by default API Key, set the relevant Access ID and Access Key:

access-id '<Access-ID>' 
access-key '<Access-Key>' 
'Profile default successfully configured'

Continue with installing the Akeyless CLI, depending on your operating system

Linux \ Mac

Once the authentication succeeds, follow the prompt to add the CLI executable to your $PATH :

Would you like to move 'akeyless' binary to: /home/username/.akeyless/bin/akeyless? (Y/n) 
The cli was successfully moved to path: /home/username/.akeyless/bin/akeyless
Would you like to add '/home/username/.akeyless/bin' To user PATH environment variable? (Y/n)
Please run the following command to start using Akeyless CLI:
	'source ~/.bash_profile'

The CLI will try to locate the user profile file (based on shell, i.e .bash_profile, .zprofile, .profile, etc), and export the USER_HOME_DIR/.akeyless/bin/ to user $PATH.

Try running the create-secretcommand to test your installation:

akeyless create-secret --name MySecret1 --value MySecretPassword

Windows

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Note

PowerShell ISE does not support interactive input mode. Please work with the PowerShell cmdlet to set up the Akeyless CLI.

Once the authentication succeeds, the following prompt will appear:

Would you like to move 'akeyless.exe' binary to: C:\Users\username\.akeyless\bin\akeyless.exe? (Y/n)
#after user inputs 'Y'
The cli was successfully moved to path: C:\Users\username\.akeyless\bin\akeyless.exe

After the Akeyless CLI Binary is moved to USER_HOME_DIR/.akeyless/bin/akeyless, another prompt will appear:

Would you like to add 'C:\Users\username\.akeyless\bin' To user PATH environment variable? (Y/n)
#after user inputs 'Y'
Run the following command to start using Akeyless CLI:
set "PATH=%PATH%;C:\Users\username\.akeyless\bin" (Update PATH for current session)
setx PATH "%PATH%;C:\Users\username\.akeyless\bin" (Update PATH permenantly)

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Note

The CLI updates the path env for the current user only. This change only takes effect after the user logs off and logs back on.

Copy and run the relevant command for your purpose (permanent or current session), after that, The CLI should be ready to use.

Try running the create-secretcommand to test your installation:

akeyless create-secret --name MySecret1 --value MySecretPassword

Non-Interactive Mode

To initiate the CLI non-interactively, run./akeyless --init which will work once only during the first time you run the CLI on that environment.
If you're working with a different tenant environment than the default, i.e. vault.akeyless.io, you can use the --akeyless-url flag to specify the tenant that the CLI will be configured to communicate with.
For example, to work with the eu tenant you would run:

./akeyless --init --akeyless-url vault.eu.akeyless.io

Working with profiles

Akeyless CLI supports profiles that can be set with different authentication methods and permissions. If you wish to configure a new profile, use the following command:

akeyless configure --profile <new profile name> --access-id <Access id> --access-key <Access key> --access-type access_key

While the default method is an API key, if you wish to use a different authentication method, please consult the CLI reference for this command.

To view the profile settings file, go to the .akeyless folder under your home directory, the profiles folder contains a toml file for each profile.

cd .akeyless/profiles/

After you've created an additional profile, add the --profile parameter with the profile name to any akeyless command to use it under that profile.

Advanced Configuration

When creating a profile in the CLI, the profile contains only the Authentication Method settings, such as Access ID, and Access Type.

However, you can configure additional parameters as defaults in your profile. Once set, these default parameters will automatically be used for your commands unless you choose to override them explicitly.

The following parameters can be added to a profile, for example, on thedeafult profile:

["default"]
  gateway_url = 'https://<Your-Akeyless-GW-URL:8000>'
  default_location_prefix = 'non-production' 
  cert_issuer_name = '/cert/IssuerName'
  cert_username = 'ubuntu'
  public_key_file_path = 'ssh/id_rsa.pub'
  legacy_signing_alg = 'true|false'

Where:

  • gateway_url: Akeyless Gateway Configuration Manager URL (port 8000).

  • default_location_prefix: A global default prefix for the name flag, relevant for all types of objects in the account. In the example above, all commands will be performed on /non-production folder.

  • cert_issuer_name: The default name of an SSH Certificate Issuer to use.

  • cert_username: The username the SSH certificate Issuer will issue the certificate for, e.g ubuntu.

  • public_key_file_path: Path to the file containing the SSH public key.

  • legacy_signing_alg: Set this option to use the SSH legacy signing algorithm.

Working with the Gateway

To re-route the entire traffic directly via your Gateway for closed environments, create an environment variable AKEYLESS_GATEWAY_URL to point your CLI to interact with the relevant Gateway:

export AKEYLESS_GATEWAY_URL=<https://Your_GW_URL:8000/api/v1> 

set AKEYLESS_GATEWAY_URL=<https://Your_GW_URL:8080>

In case your Gateway uses a self-signed certificate not trusted by your machine, set the environment variable AKEYLESS_TRUSTED_TLS_CERTIFICATE_FILE with the location of your PEM file.

Working with Zero-Knowledge Encryption

You can work with items that are protected by Zero-Knowledge Encryption from the CLI without specifying the Gateway, as Akeyless will automatically detect it based on the Customer Fragment ID.

However, if the AKEYLESS_GATEWAY_URL environment variable is set, Akeyless will use the Gateway from that variable, and the automatic detection won't work.

Precedence Configuration

Settings can be found in various locations, such as environment variables, the profile configuration file, or directly as command-line parameters. Some locations have higher precedence than others, in this order:

  1. Command line options: Overrides settings in any other location, including environment variables and profile configuration file.

  2. Environment variables: Overrides settings in the profile configuration file.

  3. Profile file: Values in the profile are used only if no explicit parameters or environment variables are set.

Troubleshooting

For access deny issues, ensure the following:

  • Permissions: Make sure the authentication method you created the profile with is associated with the proper role with the authority to perform the action you tried.

  • Profile configuration file: Make sure your profile configuration file is valid and that everything is spelled correctly and matches the authentication method you chose.

Tutorial

Check out our tutorial video on Installing and Configuring the CLI.

Updated 26 days ago

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