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Configuring Ory services

All Ory services share the same configuration system. This page documents the details and edge cases that apply to all Ory services.

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Please note that Ory Oathkeeper uses an old configuration library and does not yet respect everything explained in this document.

To find out more about configuring the individual services head to their corresponding sections.

Configuration Format​

In Ory, configuration keys use underscores to separate words:

some_config: value
# Not:
# someConfig: value

Often, configuration keys have sub-keys

oauth2:
  require_client_auth: true

or arrays:

social_sign_in:
  providers:
    - provider: google

Loading Configuration from Files​

Configuration can be loaded from the file system. Ory supports loading configuration from YAML

some_config: value

and JSON files

{
  "some_config": "value"
}

You can combine several configuration files by defining the -c or --config flag multiple times when calling the CLI command or when importing configuration files to Ory Cloud:

someCommand --config file/a.yml --config file/b.yml

The files are then merged in order. Here, a.yml's values are overwritten by b.yml.

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When merging configuration values, the configuration system will try its best to merge the keys. Please note that array values can will be overwritten!

--- # file A
foo:
  - id: bar
--- # file B
foo:
  - id: baz
--- # Result
foo:
  - id: baz

Loading Configuration from Environment Variables​

In cases where you need to load secret values - this is usually the case when deploying Ory open source services yourself - you can use environment variables to override configuration values from files or CLI flags.

It is possible to set any configuration value from environment variables. To understand how this works, let's look at an example:

some:
  nested_key:
    with_a_value: foo
    and_array:
      - id: foo
      - id: bar

The above values can be set with using the following environment variables:

# Linux / macOS
export SOME_NESTED_KEY_WITH_A_VALUE=foo
export SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_0_ID=foo
export SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_1_ID=bar

# Windows CMD
set SOME_NESTED_KEY_WITH_A_VALUE=foo
set SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_0_ID=foo
set SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_1_ID=bar

# Windows Powershell
$env:SOME_NESTED_KEY_WITH_A_VALUE = foo
$env:SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_0_ID = foo
$env:SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_1_ID = bar

As you can see, subkeys are separated with an underscore _. If a subkey is an array, you can reference the array item by using the array index (0, 1). It is also possible to define a new array by using an array index that is not yet set:

export SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY_2_BAR=baz

The above would result in:

some:
  nested_key:
    with_a_value: foo
    and_array:
      - id: foo
      - bar: bar

It is also possible to use JSON strings to denote complex configuration keys:

# Linux / macOS
export SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY='[{"id":"foo"},{"id":"bar"}]'
# Windows CMD
set SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY='[{"id":"foo"},{"id":"bar"}]'
# Windows Powershell
$env:SOME_NESTED_KEY_AND_ARRAY = '[{"id":"foo"},{"id":"bar"}]'

Loading Configuration from CLI Flags​

When using the CLI, you can also set configuration values using CLI flags. This option however is very rare and you will usually find configuration files or environment variables to set configuration values. To find information about CLI flags, append the help flag (-h) to the command you wish to use.

Configuration Types​

Ory uses JSON Schemas to define the configuration layout. JSON Schema defines types, which means that Ory is able to guess the type and convert strings (e.g. when using environment variables) to the correct type! A boolean type is converted to true or false accordingly for:

export SOME_VAR=true
export SOME_OTHER_VAR=false

The same applies to strings and numbers!

Configuration References​

All of Ory's services have a full configuration reference available. You can find them here: