@Marvin if using the self-hosted prefect server on an Azure Container Instance, how will the worker container authenticate to the server?

✅ thought for 284.6 seconds

you can either set the env vars for the process directly

PREFECT_API_URL=.... PREFECT_AUTH_STRING=... prefect worker start

Short answer: it depends on whether you enable auth on your self-hosted Server. - No auth (default): Workers just need

PREFECT_API_URL

pointing to your Server’s API, e.g.

http://<host>:4200/api

. No API key is required or used by OSS Server. - With auth enabled: If you set

PREFECT_SERVER_API_AUTH_STRING="user:pass"

on the Server, then workers must send the same credentials via

PREFECT_API_AUTH_STRING="user:pass"

. The client will use HTTP Basic auth automatically. Typical env for a worker container (e.g., in Azure Container Instances):

# No auth (default server)
PREFECT_API_URL=<http://your-server:4200/api>

# If you enable server auth
PREFECT_API_URL=<http://your-server:4200/api>
PREFECT_API_AUTH_STRING=user:pass

Start the worker:

prefect worker start -p your-work-pool

Notes - Do not use

PREFECT_API_KEY

with self-hosted Server; that’s for Prefect Cloud. - When a worker submits flow runs, it propagates its Prefect settings (including

PREFECT_API_URL

and auth) into the flow-run environment, so your flows can talk back to the same Server. - If your Server is exposed publicly, consider putting it behind TLS and enabling basic auth. Docs and references - Security settings (basic auth for self-hosted): Security settings - Settings reference (env vars): Settings reference - Workers overview: Workers - Self-hosted server CLI: Self-hosted server CLI If you plan to enable basic auth on your ACI-hosted Server, I can share a concrete

az container create

example with the right environment variables for both the Server and the Worker—would that help?