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Create a key

Make a board key, keep it safe, rotate and revoke it.

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Best practices< PreviousRead and writeNext >

On this page

Keep it safeRotate or revoke
  1. Open the board, then Settings → Developer.
  2. Create key. Name it after what will use it — "Lead vendor", "Nightly sync".
  3. Choose its scopes — only what it needs:
    • Read (read) — the board's shape and rows.
    • Add rows (rows:write) — add records. It never reads back what is already there.
  4. Copy the key. It is shown once; Specter keeps only a fingerprint.

The dialog also shows ready-to-run curl commands with your key and one of the board's columns filled in, and a Test key button that reads the board through it.

bash
export SPECTER_KEY='sbk_…'

Send it on every request, in either header:

http
Authorization: Bearer $SPECTER_KEYX-API-Key: $SPECTER_KEY

Keep it safe

Server-side only

Never put a key in a browser, a mobile app or source control. For a form on a web page, use a Specter form instead.

  • Keep keys in environment variables or a secret manager.
  • One key per integration, so revoking one never stops another.
  • Each key's calls and failures are under View logs in Settings → Developer.

Rotate or revoke

To rotate: create a new key with the same scopes, move the integration to it, check View logs, then revoke the old one. Revoke stops a key immediately; it answers 401 from then on.