MIME-Version: 1.0
References: <202601231423.4522ubhwkcwj@alvherre.pgsql> <3112825.1769185807@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 <CAOYmi+kwVHbra-80wSC7Rh9OGttdd8QFV+VcBtSNkEkux6XkyQ@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <CAOYmi+kwVHbra-80wSC7Rh9OGttdd8QFV+VcBtSNkEkux6XkyQ@mail.gmail.com>
From: Thomas Munro <thomas.munro@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 25 Jan 2026 12:14:19 +1300
Message-ID: <CA+hUKGKXHBCptORqu2jZf5o0Gw45Q7YMW9wKmrXYDm35uQStoA@mail.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Time to drop RADIUS support?
To: Jacob Champion <jacob.champion@enterprisedb.com>
Cc: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>, =?UTF-8?Q?=C3=81lvaro_Herrera?= <alvherre@kurilemu.de>, 
	Michael Banck <mbanck@gmx.net>, PostgreSQL Hackers <pgsql-hackers@lists.postgresql.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Archived-At: <https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/CA%2BhUKGKXHBCptORqu2jZf5o0Gw45Q7YMW9wKmrXYDm35uQStoA%40mail.gmail.com>
Precedence: bulk

On Sat, Jan 24, 2026 at 6:50=E2=80=AFAM Jacob Champion
<jacob.champion@enterprisedb.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 23, 2026 at 8:30=E2=80=AFAM Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrot=
e:
> > > I don't think removing it entirely from all back branches is a good
> > > idea, without first making sure that there are no users.
> >
> > Agreed, we can't pull it from the back branches.  But I'm in favor of
> > pulling it from HEAD if we document how to use PAM-based RADIUS
> > instead.  I agree with Thomas' argument that the cost-benefit ratio
> > of fixing our implementation would be poor.
>
> +1.

Great, it sounds like we have a plan.  I think the wiki might be a
good place for that documentation.  The details are likely to change,
and I wouldn't want to have to maintain that information in-tree, so I
created some PAM how-to documentation at
https://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/RADIUS after testing on Debian and
FreeBSD.  We could point to that from the 19 release notes and in the
deprecation notice added to the documentation for 14-18, calling it
"community-maintained guidance on migration to supported
configurations".  Do we need to keep any trace of this in the 19 docs,
and if so, where?  A new tombstone section?