Docs
Launch GraphOS Studio

Connecting and authenticating with the Explorer

Learn about CORS policies and authentication options in the Explorer


The Explorer automatically attempts to connect to your at the URL specified in its Settings tab.

💡 TIP

When you use the Explorer with a cloud supergraph, the endpoint URL is always the URL of your current 's -managed .

Depending on your 's settings, you might need to configure the Explorer's connection to handle CORS requirements or authentication.

CORS policies

Requests from the Explorer go straight from your browser to your , so your endpoint sees requests coming from this domain: https://studio.apollographql.com

It's common for public endpoints to set CORS policies that restrict which domains can them. If your endpoint has CORS protections enabled, you probably need to safelist https://studio.apollographql.com in your CORS policy to use the Explorer.

To do so, include the following header(s) in your server's responses:

Access-Control-Allow-Origin: https://studio.apollographql.com
# Include this only if your server *also* authenticates via cookies.
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true

NOTE

If you can't change your CORS policy, you might be able to create a proxy for your endpoint and point the Explorer to the proxy instead. CORS policies are enforced by browsers, and the proxy won't have the same issues communicating with your endpoint.

Authentication

The Explorer provides features to help you authenticate via request headers, cookies, and scripts.

💡 TIP

If your has authentication requirements that aren't covered by these options, please contact support@apollographql.com with questions or feedback.

Request headers

The bottom panel of the Explorer includes a Headers tab where you can set headers that are included in your 's HTTP request.

Headers can include the values of environment variables, which are injected using double curly braces as shown:

Setting Explorer headers with environment variables

Cookies

If your server uses cookies to authenticate, you can configure your endpoint to share those cookies with https://studio.apollographql.com

To set this up, your cookie's value must contain SameSite=None; Secure. Additionally, the following CORS headers must be present in your server's response to Studio:

Access-Control-Allow-Origin: https://studio.apollographql.com
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true

Once configured, requests sent from https://studio.apollographql.com include the cookies from your domain when you run queries with the Explorer. If you're logged in on your domain, requests from the Explorer will also be logged in. If you log out on your domain and the cookie is removed, requests from the Explorer will be logged out.

Cookies for Safari users

Safari 13.1 and later blocks third-party cookies by default. When using Explorer in Safari, it considers your server's endpoint to be "third-party" to . Therefore, Safari users need to open Settings > Privacy in Safari and deselect Prevent cross-site tracking to send Explorer requests with cookies.

Environment variables

The Explorer's Settings tab includes a section for defining environment variables. Here, you can provide sensitive information that you can then inject into header values, variables, or scripts. This lets you share (including their headers) with other team members without exposing this sensitive data.

Defining

You define environment variables in the Explorer's Settings tab, like so:

Setting Explorer environment variables

If you share an that uses environment variables with your team members, your values for those environment variables are not shared, and other users can provide their own values.

Injecting

You can inject your Explorer environment variables into any of the following:

Header values

Inject an environment variable into an HTTP header value by surrounding the variable's name with double curly braces, as shown:

Setting Explorer headers with environment variables
GraphQL variables

Inject an environment variable into a variable value by surrounding the variable's name with double curly braces, as shown:

Setting Explorer GraphQL variables with environment variables
Custom scripts

If you create a preflight or operation script, that script can access an environment variable's value like so:

const secretToken = explorer.environment.get('token');

Check out the Explorer scripting docs to learn how you can use preflight scripts for authentication purposes.

Previous
GraphQL subscription support
Next
Custom scripts
Edit on GitHubEditForumsDiscord

© 2024 Apollo Graph Inc.

Privacy Policy

Company