From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
To: Mark Dilger <hornschnorter@gmail.com>
cc: Dave Page <dpage@pgadmin.org>,
        Peter Eisentraut <peter.eisentraut@2ndquadrant.com>,
        Stephen Frost <sfrost@snowman.net>,
        Robert Haas <robertmhaas@gmail.com>,
        PostgreSQL Hackers <pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: Monitoring roles patch
In-reply-to: <248F178D-0A7F-4C6E-963C-BDEFB295CB67@gmail.com>
References: 
 <CA+OCxoyRdsc1xyLfF9s698gUGyPXBs4CvJ+0Gwo8U65NmYJ7pw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CA+TgmobveXzVPytFOO3AkmsM+Y=YEG+UXcCvgwAt+SgYj85OCA@mail.gmail.com>
 <CA+OCxox9c9-1=bXxA6-gr-iWZbD5zdHYMz=cpC034RKB7zX40Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <CA+TgmoZ5zs50mEzALJqp3qBMC+CdT0ccnjvNJt1Ojiu9rz35zw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20170322131510.GC9812@tamriel.snowman.net>
 <CA+OCxoyt9OMWaK=g2sL8qCTcwrS-8j3=06AZLzXQZ61sUn7gtA@mail.gmail.com>
 <CA+OCxozGTGd-x+cx03N=KJVK=soJwOpTWkq_=zac3P04aBCU4Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <20170323122335.GK9812@tamriel.snowman.net>
 <CA+OCxozZxJouNjY4+-heYSUk=qagoytQXnSjMyO5-R_a_mddKA@mail.gmail.com>
 <c1d3db24-85f0-96bb-0ec3-aeddd9d35941@2ndquadrant.com>
 <CA+OCxox8HW6obNKY5atVA6pX=Z=wQw6rTGcggy4N05k=mLkaAQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <FEE8D3A7-FDBF-432F-BEEF-F28B7D3AD2F4@gmail.com>
 <CA+OCxoy7rqEZ65byS+3E_0dsTKYD8NcUzQB1SiGknARmbxBTDg@mail.gmail.com>
 <957FCA21-99DA-4477-9A6E-C86ACAC23E36@gmail.com>
 <7161672F-1EC5-478F-B307-FF28B01D0D62@gmail.com>
 <19369.1490727172@sss.pgh.pa.us> <248F178D-0A7F-4C6E-963C-BDEFB295!
 CB67@gmail.com>
Comments: In-reply-to Mark Dilger <hornschnorter@gmail.com>
	message dated "Tue, 28 Mar 2017 12:30:40 -0700"
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Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2017 16:17:12 -0400
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Mark Dilger <hornschnorter@gmail.com> writes:
> I don't see anything wrong with adding roles in pg_authid.h with a #defin=
e'd
> Oid.  That's actually pretty helpful for anyone writing code against the =
database,
> as they don't have to look up the Oid of the role.

> But why not then grant privileges to that role in information_schema.sql?=
=20

To the extent that the desired privileges can be represented at the SQL
level, I agree that that's a better solution than hard-wiring checks in C
code.  The problem comes in with cases where that's not fine-grained
enough.  Consider a policy like "anybody can select from pg_stat_activity,
but unless you have privilege X, the query column should read as nulls
except for sessions belonging to you".  That behavior can't realistically
be represented as a separate SQL privilege.  Right now we have "privilege
X" for this purpose hard-coded as "is superuser", but it would be much
better if it were associated with a grantable role.

			regards, tom lane


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