Step 2: Configure Sources

Now that Inboxclaw is running, it's time to connect it to your real accounts. Sources are where your data comes from — Gmail, your bank, Google Calendar, and so on.

What Is a Source?

A source is a connector that watches an external service for changes. Each source knows how to talk to one specific service, check for new activity, and turn it into a standardized event that the rest of Inboxclaw can work with.

You can run as many sources as you want at the same time. Each one polls its service independently.

How the Configuration File Works

All sources are defined in your config.yaml under the sources section. Each source gets a name (you choose it) and a set of options specific to that service.

Here's what it looks like with two sources:

sources:
  my_email:
    type: gmail
    poll_interval: "5m"
    credentials_path: ./credentials.json

  my_bank:
    type: fio
    poll_interval: "1h"
    token: "${FIO_API_TOKEN}"

A few things to notice:

• type tells Inboxclaw which connector to use.
• poll_interval controls how often Inboxclaw checks for new data. You can use human-readable values like "30s", "5m", or "1h".
• Secrets like API tokens can be stored in environment variables and referenced with ${VAR_NAME}. Create a .env file in the project root to keep them out of your config.

Google Services: Authentication

If you're connecting Gmail, Google Calendar, or Google Drive, a simple API key isn't enough. Google requires a one-time authentication step through your browser:

inboxclaw google auth

This opens a browser window where you sign in with your Google account and grant Inboxclaw permission to read your data. The credentials are saved locally so you only need to do this once.

For the full details, see the Google Auth CLI Guide.

What Is Coalescing?

Some sources are noisy. For example, if someone edits a Google Doc ten times in five minutes, you probably don't want ten separate events — you want one event that says "this document was updated."

That's what coalescing does. It groups rapid-fire updates for the same item and waits for things to settle down before emitting a single, clean event. This keeps your sinks from being flooded with duplicate notifications.

Coalescing is configured per source. For the full explanation, see Event Coalescing.

Available Sources

Source	What it watches	Docs
Gmail	New emails and label changes	Gmail Source
Google Calendar	New and updated calendar events	Google Calendar Source
Google Drive	File changes and new files	Google Drive Source
Fio Banka	Bank transactions	Fio Source
Faktury Online	Invoice changes	Faktury Online Source
Home Assistant	Device and sensor state changes	Home Assistant Source
GoCardless / Nordigen	Bank account data across EU banks	Nordigen Source
Mock	Fake test events	Mock Source

Click through to the source you want to set up — each page has its own getting started section with the exact configuration you need.

For a general overview of how all sources work, see Sources Overview.

Next Step

→ Step 3: Configure Sinks — decide where your events should be delivered.