Obtain and use a token

When a function in rtoot can’t find a valid token on your computer, it automatically starts authentication. If you want to start the process manually, you can do so by calling:

library(rtoot)
auth_setup()

By default, the token is stored in a directory R has determined to make sense for you and it is called “rtoot_token.rds”. So you do not need to worry about it if you are only using rtoot on your local machine and you are only using one token.

If you do not change the path argument of auth_setup() the tokens get stored in the location returned by tools::R_user_dir("rtoot", "config"). Look there, if you want to copy a token to a different computer (ideally in the directory returned by tools::R_user_dir("rtoot", "config") on the new machine).

If you want to use multiple tokens, you should change the name of the file the token is saved in:

auth_setup(name = "account1")

To use this token, you can either read it into your environment and provide it to each function:

token <- readRDS(file.path(tools::R_user_dir("rtoot", "config"), "account1.rds"))
get_status(id = "109297677620300632", instance = "mastodon.social", token = token)

Or you can set the default token in the options at the start of a session:

options("rtoot_token" = file.path(tools::R_user_dir("rtoot", "config"), "account1.rds"))

Environment variable

For advanced users, you can also store your token as an environment variable (envvar). You can either obtain a token by calling

auth_setup(clipboard = TRUE)

Or, if you already have a token

token <- readRDS(file.path(tools::R_user_dir("rtoot", "config"), "account1.rds"))
content <- convert_token_to_envvar(token)

Paste the content from clipboard to your configuration file. If you don’t have access to clipboard, inspect content.