How to Create a Salesforce Connection with Celigo CLI

With the CLI configured and the integration created, the next step is to add the Salesforce connection. You should have a salesforce-google-sheets-integration directory with integrations.json from the previous post.

If you haven’t created the integration yet, start with How to Create an Integration with Celigo CLI

TL;DR

Create a Salesforce connection with celigo connections create, authorize it with celigo connections authorize, and verify the connection with celigo connections ping. The connection definition is stored as JSON, while OAuth authentication is handled separately from the resource configuration.

The workflow separates connection configuration from authentication. Define the connection in JSON, create it with celigo connections create, authorize it with celigo connections authorize, and verify it with celigo connections ping.

Creating the Salesforce Connection

From salesforce-google-sheets-integration, create a connections directory for connection definitions:

cd salesforce-google-sheets-integration
mkdir connections
cd connections

Create the connection definition as celigo-cli-demo-only-salesforce-connection.json

NOTE: Use descriptive resource names. Clear names make resources easier to identify and manage as an integration grows.

vim celigo-cli-demo-only-salesforce-connection.json

The required fields are type and name. The type identifies the connector, while name provides a readable name for the connection. Additional Salesforce-specific settings can be defined in a nested salesforce object when needed.

{
  "type": "salesforce",
  "name": "Celigo CLI Demo only Salesforce Connection"
}

Create the connection by redirecting the definition file to the CLI:

celigo connections create < celigo-cli-demo-only-salesforce-connection.json

Once the command completes successfully, the connection is created in integrator.io, and the CLI returns the connection ID, timestamps, name, and other resource properties:

~/Dev/salesforce-google-sheets-integration/connections ❯ celigo connections create < celigo-cli-demo-only-salesforce-connection.json
_id                           <YOUR_SALESFORCE_CONNECTION_ID>
createdAt                     2026-08-22T08:59:37.830Z
lastModified                  2026-08-22T08:59:37.863Z
type                          salesforce
name                          Celigo CLI Demo only Salesforce Connection
enableMicroBatchForOneToMany  true
enableCsvObjectParsing        true
salesforce                    {
  "scope": [],
  "concurrencyLevel": 5,
  "targetConcurrencyLevel": 5
}
autoRecoverRateLimitErrors    true
microServices                 {
  "disableNetSuiteWebservices": false,
  "disableNetSuiteDistributed": false,
  "disableNetSuiteProxy": false,
  "disableHttp": false,
  "disableS3": false,
  "disableSalesforce": false,
  "disableAs2": false,
  "disableFtp": false,
  "disableAs2File": false,
  "disableDataLoaderFile": false,
  "disableEdiServiceFlowRun": false,
  "enableDemandConcurrency": false,
  "disableDemandConcurrency": false
}

NOTE: The connection definition contains no authentication material. For OAuth-based connections, authentication is handled separately through celigo connections authorize rather than stored in the resource definition.

You can verify the new connection from the integrator.io web interface or query it directly from the CLI:

celigo connections list --format json
celigo connections list --format table

Authorizing and Testing the Connection

Authorize the connection to complete the Salesforce OAuth flow:

celigo connections authorize <YOUR_SALESFORCE_CONNECTION_ID>

The command opens the Salesforce authorization flow in a browser and waits for authorization to complete.

You can verify the connection at any time:

celigo connections ping 6a7ff1dbe27c416118751eb0

ping sends a test request to Salesforce using the connection’s current authentication state. If the connection has not been authorized, the command returns an unauthorized_connection error:

~/Dev/s/connections ❯ celigo connections ping <YOUR_SALESFORCE_CONNECTION_ID>
errors  [
  {
    "code": "unauthorized_connection",
    "message": "Invalid or unauthorized connection. Please authorize the Salesforce connection.",
    "source": "connection"
  }
]

If you see this response, authorize the connection with celigo connections authorize and run ping again.

At this point, your integration directory should look like this:

~/Dev/salesforce-google-sheets-integration ❯ tree
.
├── connections
│   └── celigo-cli-demo-only-salesforce-connection.json
└── integrations.json

In the next post, How to Create a Google Sheets Connection with Celigo CLI, we’ll create and authorize the Google Sheets connection that will serve as the import destination for the flow.