To: Maria.L.Wilson-1@nasa.gov
cc: "Plugge, Joe R." <JRPlugge@west.com>, "Wilson,
	Maria Louise (LARC-E301)[SCIENCE SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS]"
	<m.l.wilson@nasa.gov>,
	"pgsql-admin@postgresql.org" <pgsql-admin@postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: postgres database user account 
In-reply-to: <4C2BA2DF.2090900@nasa.gov> 
References: <4C2B97BE.7040405@nasa.gov>
	<BD69807DAE0CE44CA00A8338D0FDD08302E49509A9@oma00cexmbx03.corp.westworlds.com>
	<4C2BA2DF.2090900@nasa.gov>
Comments: In-reply-to "Maria L. Wilson" <Maria.L.Wilson-1@nasa.gov>
	message dated "Wed, 30 Jun 2010 16:02:39 -0400"
Date: Wed, 30 Jun 2010 16:16:43 -0400
Message-ID: <16427.1277929003@sss.pgh.pa.us>
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>

"Maria L. Wilson" <Maria.L.Wilson-1@nasa.gov> writes:
> so what about the operating system account that is different?  What we 
> are planning on doing with the OS acct (postgres) is only allowing users 
> sudo ability to this account.  Nobody should be able to directly log 
> into it.  Do you think that will cause problems?

No, that's pretty standard.  RPM installations for example have never
assigned a password to the postgres OS account, so it will behave in
exactly that way.

Usually the only things you need the OS account for are to start/stop
the server and update its outside-the-database configuration files,
such as postgresql.conf.

			regards, tom lane